Do the math:  According to the numbers in the Winnipeg Police Annual Report, crime in Winnipeg may be up by as much as 9% and not down 7% as stated. 

As I made my way through the just released 2010 Winnipeg Police Annual Report I admired the politically correct pictures, and the really cute picture of the puppies.

It was when I got to the meat of the matter, the statistics that is, that I realized that there was a problem with the report – a big problem.

Winnipeg Police Annual Reports have traditionally reported on the number of Criminal Code Offences both geographically (by district of occurrence) and temporally ( month of occurrence).  This year is no different, however, in each case a new column has been added.

The Criminal Code Offences By District Table has a new column titled “not district specific” .  A total of 9548 offences are reported in this column including 1 homicide, 138 robberies and  8109  “theft $5000 or under (Non-Motor Vehicle)”.  It seems inconceivable that the Police Service took reports of over 8000 thefts and was not able to determine in which of the five police districts the theft occurred.  But, as there is no note attached to this newly introduced column, one must assume that is the case.  Whatever happened to occurrences being assigned a location by address and atom?

The Criminal Code Offences By Month Table also saw the addition of a new column, again without any note or explanation attached.  The column is titled “Undertermined”.  I’m assuming it should read as ‘undetermined’.  This column lists 8521 offences.  They include 132 robberies and 7707 Theft $5000 or Under (Non-Motor Vehicle) offences.  Again, one would think that the police should be able to determine with some degree of accuracy when people were robbed and where and when they had their property stolen.  Without any note or explanation attached to this addition to the annual report one must assume they can not.

Lastly, the big one.  The 2010 Annual Report lists the total number of Criminal Code Offences reported to police in 2010 as 61,680.  The report says that this represents a reduction of 7% from the previous year.  Here is the problem:  the 2009 Annual Report lists the total number of crimes reported as 56,427.  Based on those numbers that would mean a 9% increase compared to 2009.  That is a 16% difference and that is significant.

Pending an explanation one must conclude, based on the numbers in the Annual Report, that crime in Winnipeg may be up by as much as 9% in 2010 compared to 2009.

I guess 12 months was just not enough time to do all the ‘figurin and cipherin’ required to get the numbers right.  I have attached a link to a video on Ma and Pa Kettle Math that might help.