Evidence that reported results are statistically inconsistent with those assumptions presents a mystery: why does this set of results seem peculiar? The solution to that mystery need not be election irregularity; it could simply be that those more-or-less plausible assumptions are not (approximately) true in that election. For instance, many irregularitydetection methods involve assumptions about the distribution of digits in correct election results. One class of methods assumes that in the absence of irregularity, the terminal digits would be uniformly distributed and independent from locality to locality. Another class of methods assumes that in the absence of irregularity, the leading digits of subtotals should follow Benford’s law, according to which the fractional part of the logarithm of election results is uniformly distributed between 0 and 1 and independent from locality to locality.