A newspaper report of part-heard criminal proceedings that reports prosecution evidence without reporting materially conflicting defence evidence (here, that a different person caused the injuries) is capable of conveying a defamatory imputation of guilt and will not be protected by the defence of fair and accurate report. Prior convictions pleaded in mitigation of defamation damages must be in the relevant sector of the plaintiff's life and sufficiently recent to affect current reputation; convictions 10-18 years old were held too remote. The majority substituted $80,000 for a $12,000 award, finding the original manifestly inadequate for front-page defamatory publications.
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