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NEW YORK - Disgraced media baron Conrad Black has renewed his assault on the American legal system that convicted him of fraud and obstruction of justice, calling it "capricious" and a disguised way of redistributing wealth from the rich.
The peer lashed out in remarks to a magazine, less than two months before he is due to appear in a Chicago court to appeal for a lenient sentence on the four charges on which he was found guilty on July 13.
Black told Men's Vogue that former directors of his Hollinger media empire had lied in court while under pressure from prosecutors.
"We have the pursuit of prominent, well-off people who get into the crosshairs of the system essentially as a substitute for a wealth and redistribution policy," he said.
"And we have a certain revulsion against extreme proliferations of wealth. Property is seized without compensation. Due process has eroded and the grand jury is no protection at all against capricious prosecutions. "
- Independent