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I'm reading Tony Hillerman's recent mystery The Shape Shifter, which is an acceptable read, overall, but midway through the book I ran into this piece of dialogue, a law enforcement official describing some information on crimes to Lt. Joe Leaphorn, retired, formerly of the Navajo Tribal Police:
“I call in the list of places. Gallup checked the files on Shewnack. Six of the eleven had the sort of out-of-the-way robberies that fit our idea of Shewnack’s mode of operations. When the checked later, the other seven looked like they fit, too.”
Is there some policeman math with which I'm not familiar? Am I the only reader who stumbles over stuff like this? Where in hell are the copy editors to catch this crap?
caw
“I call in the list of places. Gallup checked the files on Shewnack. Six of the eleven had the sort of out-of-the-way robberies that fit our idea of Shewnack’s mode of operations. When the checked later, the other seven looked like they fit, too.”
Is there some policeman math with which I'm not familiar? Am I the only reader who stumbles over stuff like this? Where in hell are the copy editors to catch this crap?
caw