The imprisoned former media tycoon Conrad Black has been freed on a $2 million bond.

A federal judge in Chicago is now deciding whether to throw out his 2007 conviction for defrauding shareholders.

Judge Amy St. Eve of the US District Court set the 65-year-old free but he must first appear in her courtroom before being released from custody.

He is currently incarcerated in a prison in Coleman, Florida.

The former owner of the Daily Telegraph was sentenced in 2007 to six-and-a-half years in prison for swindling media holding company Hollinger International Inc. out of $6.1 million.

Black and three colleagues were convicted for a scheme where they paid themselves tax-free bonuses disguised as non-compete fees as they sold off pieces of the Hollinger empire.

Canadian-born Black, a British peer who once led the world's third-largest newspaper publisher with titles including the Jerusalem Post, Canada's National Post and the Chicago Sun-Times, entered a Florida prison in March 2008.

Last month, Black won a victory when the US high court limited the reach of the federal fraud law used in corruption cases against government officials and executives like Black and former Enron Chief Executive Jeffrey Skilling.