An Innocent Man?

I have been highlighting Conrad Black in recent weeks. Here is the latest news on him personally from the BBC:

A US judge has resentenced former media tycoon Conrad Black to 42 months in prison for fraud and obstruction.

The Canadian-born British peer is likely to serve just 13 months because of time already served.

He was convicted in 2007 of defrauding shareholders in media holding company Hollinger of $6.1m (£3.8m) but freed in 2010 after the US Supreme Court court found an anti-corruption law unconstitutional.

I have no idea if he is innocent or guilty. (Here is Black's version of the events in question.) I used to be able to decide this, in my own mind anyway, based on if a conviction occurred. I an no longer so confident in the legal system. Mark Steyn at National Review Online comments:

The federal justice system is a bit like one of those unmanned drones President Obama is so fond of using on the unfortunate villagers of Waziristan. Once it’s locked on to you and your coordinates are in the system, it’s hard to get it called off. Three years ago, during his trial in Chicago, I suggested to the defendant he’d be better off saving his gazillions in legal fees and instead climbing under the tarp in the bed of my truck and letting me drive him over the minimally enforced Pittsburg-La Patrie border crossing to Quebec and thence by fishing boat to a remote landing strip on Miquelon where a waiting plane could spirit him somewhere beyond the reach of the U.S. Attorney. Estimated cost: about a thousandth of what he’d spent on lawyers to date. P’shaw, scoffed Conrad, or ejaculations to that effect. He was not a fugitive but an innocent man, and eventually he would be vindicated by the justice system of this great republic.

Being skeptical of government is a good thing. But the distrust of government today, while deserved to a degree, is very dangerous. If we can not trust our court system, then nothing is trustworthy.