[Vision2020] "Murder" rate in Moscow

[Tom Hansen]

In my opinion the murder rate per 100,000 population is truly irrelevant.
The murder rate should be analyzed on a per-year basis.  To me that would be
considerably more significant.

Example:  Suppose John McGillicuddy of Anytown, USA kills himself and his
spouse.  Now say that, prior to these murders, Anytown's population was
100,000 of which four were members of the McGillicuddy family.  Now suddenly
the murder rate of Anytown, USA is two per 100,000, yet the murder rate of
the McGillicuddy family (extrapolated out) is 50,000 per 100,000 (or 50%).
The question then becomes: Just how long (duration in time) are these
statistics valid? One week?  One month?  A thousand years?

Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"We're a town of about 23,000 with 10,000 college students. The college
students are not very active in local elections (thank goodness!)."

- Dale Courtney (March 28, 2007)

-----Original Message-----
From: vision2020-bounces at moscow.com [mailto:vision2020-bounces at moscow.com]
On Behalf Of Don Coombs
Sent: Saturday, July 07, 2007 1:23 PM
To: vision2020 at moscow.com
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] "Murder" rate in Moscow

According to a headline in this morning's Daily News, 
the "rash of violent crimes have taken toll on Moscow, 
Latah County." The story says "Despite concerns, Latah 
County's murder rate isn't high when comparing it to 
similarly-sized counties."

And: "With seven murders and 35,600 people in Latah 
County, the murder rate is .019 murder per 100,000 
people this year.... In the United States, the overall 
murder rate was 5.6 per 100,000 in 2006."

People at the newspaper apparently had no problem with 
a murder rate of .019 per 100,000. Actually, if you 
accept that there have been seven murders, the rate is 
easily calculated to be about 19 per 100,000.

Also: Some of the homicides were murders, but with 
living suspects the term would be best saved for 
application after they are found guilty of that 
specific crime.

Don Coombs

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