Tuesday 23 August 2011

Murdoch Maths?

The front page of the Sunday Times had a headline that police could be looking for 30,000 rioters. How did they get that figure? Simple, according to police, there were between 1,500 and 3,000 reported crimes during the riots and each crime has "up to" ten people involved. Therefore "up to" 30,000 rioters.

Am I the only one who can see the massive holes in that reasoning? If I were Ben Goldacre, I could probably spin this out to a full article, but I won't, I'll just leave it there.