Much to my surprise David Radler, the ex-partner of Lord Black, has pleaded guilty to charges concerning Hollinger:

David Radler, the former
right hand man of disgraced media tycoon Conrad Black, pleaded guilty
to fraud charges yesterday in a Chicago courtroom.

The
plea could prove a pivotal moment in the long-running investigation
into the alleged looting of Hollinger International, the newspaper
group that until last year owned the Daily Telegraph. "This is the
first step in making amends for what has taken place," Mr Radler’s
lawyer, Anton Valukas, said after the hearing.

Mr
Radler had been a business partner of Lord Black for 35 years and was
the financier behind the flamboyant former press baron. But there were
clear signs of a crack in the relationship last month when Mr Radler
was indicted on seven fraud charges, each carrying up to five years in
prison.

I was sure that he (or they) would simply stonewall forever. This is a guess but there might be something to do with a difference in the way in which sentencing is done in the US. Over here, if someone was facing 7 charges each carrying a five year sentence then assume that they were found guilty of all of them. They’d get a sentence of 2-5 years, maybe on one, maybe on all of them, but the sentences would normally run "concurrently". That is, all are served at the same time. In the US it is much more likely that such sentences will run "consecutively", that is, that one might serve 35 years whereas in the UK one might serve 3 say.

Precisely the threat of asking the judge to make sentences run consecutively gives enormous power to prosecutors to get plea bargains. Whether that’s a good idea or not is another matter…facing the possibility of the rest of one’s life in jail over whatever deal on offer for pleading guilty might (and I’m not suggesting it happened in this case) lead  the inncoent to make that plea.

Update: From the Times:

Radler, who had worked with Lord Black since the
late 1960s, was told that American federal prosecutors were
recommending to the court that he serve 29 months in jail and pay a
$250,000 fine (£140,000) — assuming that he co-operates fully.