Does the media exaggerate Crime?

Former Crime watch presenter Nick Ross certainly thinks so.Speaking on the today programme on Radio 4 yesterday he said

"The media have long been peddling a big lie about crime, either that or they have been astonishingly incompetent about persuading their listeners, readers and viewers of the truth because the truth is that crime has been declining for well over a decade. "

Events this week may show that he is right.In the first additions on Friday morning before the cash for honours story brokeboth the Telegraph and the Times were leading with one particular example from the annual British crime survey

Drink to blame as violence rises by 5pc reported the Telegraph

A Home Office report disclosed that offences of assault, criminal damage and harassment between 3am and 6am rose sharply in the 12 months after the reforms came in. The figures are a blow to ministers who had argued that staggered and later closing times would reduce crime levels by avoiding the traditional 11pm rush on to the streets, which often resulted in ugly clashes between drunken revellers and police.

The critics of Nick Ross say that he is being selective in using the figures but that critique could also be levelled at the newspapers.

This from the Guardian on the same day

Home Office criminologists portrayed Britain as becoming a "less violent nation" with half a million fewer violent crime victims than in 1995 - a fall of 45%. They insisted yesterday that the 5% rise in violent crime recorded by the BCS was "not statistically significant".
Their claims are supported by a fall in the murder rate to its lowest level for eight years with 755 homicides, and a 13% fall in gun crime according to the police. Death by dangerous driving however is becoming an increasing problem with a record 462 killed this way last year.

Whereas the Times was reporting

Violent crime and robberies rose last year, as did the risk of becoming a victim of crime, while the overall number of offences is slightly down, the Government said today.
Four out of 10 people thought crime had gone up in their local area, according to the annual British Crime Survey, based on interviews with more than 40,000 people.
Drink and drug-fuelled crime has also seen a rise, with over one million victims believing that the offenders were under the influence of alcohol. There were 462 offences of causing death by dangerous driving or while under the influence of drink or drugs.

The Middle Market papers have a long history of pulling out crome facts and sensationalising particular statistics,immigrants and migrants being targeting in particular.

The reports though of the annual crime survey served to show that you can make statistics reflect by and large what you want them to.