Conrad Black's pardon by Trump is absolutely NOT an exoneration

One of Canada's most embarrassing products, Conrad Black, has been pardoned and  "exonerated" by his buddy and one-time business crony (in the days when Black actually had a business), Donald Trump.
Black was convicted by twelve good men and true in the American courts back in 2007 of fraud and obstruction of justice, and served over three years in a Florida jail, even though he has consistently averred his innocence.
Since then, Lord Black of Crossharbour, as he is also known since renouncing his Canadian citizenship to become a British Lord in 2001, has had his 1990 Order of Canada rescinded, and seen his business empire shatter, and has been renting a house he once owned in the tony Bridal Path neighbourhood of Toronto.
Black has also consistently praised Donald Trump as a great businessman and politician, and even wrote a hefty and glowing tome on the man, while Trump has returned the compliments in spades, commending Black's "tremendous contributions to business, as well as to political and historical thought".
So, it is perhaps no surprise that Trump has issued Black with a pardon - the President tends to issue pardons to people he likes rather than to the most deserving. Of course, Black insists that his personal relationship with Trump was nothing to do with his pardon.
What really rankles about all this, though, is Black's claim that Trump's pardon completely exonerates and vindicates him: "This completes the complete destruction of the spurious prosecution of me. It's a complete final decision of not guilty. That is finally a fully just verdict." Now, Black is clearly an intelligent, or at least very well-educated, guy, and he knows that is just not true, and that a word from Donald Trump does not completely outweigh an extensive trial by jury and judicial review. He must know that, even legally, what he says is not true. The US Department of Justice is very clear on this, specifying that a presidential pardon is nothing more than an expression of the President's forgiveness, usually offered to an offender who has accepted responsibility for a crime and exhibited good behaviour. "It does not change the fact of conviction, imply innocence, or remove civil disabilities that apply to the convicted person as a result of the criminal conviction", the DoJ states in black and white.
Well, one thing the pardon does grant Black is access to the United States, once denied him by his conviction. So, we can but hope that he moves permanently to the USA. I'm sure he'd be much happier there.