In the wrong hands, math can be deadly. Even the simplest numbers can
become powerful forces when manipulated by politicians or the media, but
in the case of the law, your liberty -- and your life -- can depend on
the right calculation.
In Math on Trial, mathematicians Leila Schneps and Coralie Colmez
describe ten trials spanning from the nineteenth century to today, in
which mathematical arguments were used -- and disastrously misused -- as
evidence. They tell the stories of Sally Clark, who was accused of
murdering her children by a doctor with a faulty sense of calculation;
of nineteenth-century tycoon Hetty Green, whose dispute over her aunt's
will became a signal case in the forensic use of mathematics; and of the
case of Amanda Knox, in which a judge's misunderstanding of probability
led him to discount critical evidence -- which might have kept her in
jail. Offering a fresh angle on cases from the nineteenth-century
Dreyfus affair to the murder trial of Dutch nurse Lucia de Berk, Schneps
and Colmez show how the improper application of mathematical concepts
can mean the difference between walking free and life in prison.
A colorful narrative of mathematical abuse, Math on Trial blends
courtroom drama, history, and math to show that legal expertise isn't't
always enough to prove a person innocent.
