The Supreme Court held that a magistrate's finding of guilt was vitiated by a failure to properly apply the Liberato direction and the criminal standard of proof, where the magistrate repeatedly framed the critical assessment as a question of whose evidence was 'preferred' and which version was more 'plausible', rather than whether the prosecution had proved its case beyond reasonable doubt. The Court held that the use of 'balance of probabilities' language at the conclusion of reasons was not a mere slip but was consistent with the substantive reasoning error revealed by the Liberato analysis. The finding of guilt for intentionally cause injury was quashed and the matter remitted for rehearing before a differently constituted Magistrates' Court.
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