TORONTO -- Hollinger Inc., the holding company through which Conrad Black ran his once-mighty media empire, said Friday it is selling its longtime headquarters in downtown Toronto, signaling another step in the former press baron's fall from grace.
Hollinger said it will sell the building, a compact but imposing 1850s neoclassical structure at 10 Toronto Street, to investment manager Morgan Meighen & Associates for C$14 million ($12.2 million).
Black, whose assets have been frozen as he awaits trial in the United States on charges he skimmed millions of dollars while heading Hollinger Inc. and its various subsidiaries, once commanded a sprawling empire from the building.
Toronto-based Hollinger controlled Chicago-based Hollinger International, and published newspapers such as the Jerusalem Post, the Chicago Sun-Times, London's Daily Telegraph, and Canada's National Post.
The building, a one-time post office, was an emblem for Canadian corporate power even before Black took control in the late 1970s, and was featured on the cover of journalist Peter C. Newman's 1975 book "The Canadian Establishment", a behind-the-scenes account of Canada's power brokers.
"If there is one building that symbolizes the imperious clout of corporate Canada, it is 10 Toronto Street," Newman wrote in Maclean's magazine in February.
The building had been the headquarters of conglomerate Argus Corp., the once-powerful corporate parent of Canadian Breweries, farm equipment giant Massey-Ferguson, the Dominion supermarket chain, and Hollinger Mines.
But it also factored into one of Black's most public disgraces, as he was videotaped removing boxes from the headquarters without permission last year while the company was under investigation.
The images, which showed Black - a member of Britain's House of Lords - passing boxes to his chauffeur to load into the car, ended up splashed across newscasts and newspapers and became a defining moment in the decline of his empire.
Black, 62, resigned as chairman and chief executive of Hollinger Inc. in 2004, as part of a failed attempt to take the company private.
He and three other Hollinger Inc. executives are set to go on trial in Chicago in March for racketeering, fraud and other charges. He has consistently denied accusations that he siphoned money from the companies he controlled.
Hollinger International, many of whose holdings have been sold off in the past few years, changed its name to Sun-Times Media Group Inc. in July in order to distance itself from the scandal.
Hollinger Inc. holds a 19.7 percent equity stake in the company, but has a 70.1 percent voting interest.
Morgan Meighen said the sale of the building is expected to close in May 2007.
($1=$1.15 Canadian)
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