How to Get a Police Report in Delaware (2026): Crash & Incident Reports

Delaware is one of the more restrictive states in this cluster on process: the Delaware State Police (DSP) does not accept walk-in requests for collision reports and has no online purchase portal at all. Every crash-report request goes by mail, along with a copy of the collision information exchange form drivers complete at the scene. Delaware is also restrictive on who may receive a crash report at all: accident reports sit outside the state's Freedom of Information Act, and the statute limits copies to the person named in the report, that person's legal representative, and insurers handling the claim.

Delaware's bodycam framework is likewise built around a severity threshold. Routine footage is expected to run through the general Freedom of Information Act exemption, while incidents involving a death or serious bodily injury go through a distinct, DOJ-controlled release process described below.

Information last verified on 2026-08-11. This article has not yet been reviewed by a licensed lawyer.

How to Get a Delaware Crash Report

How to order: Delaware State Police accepts crash-report requests by mail only. There is no online portal and no walk-in option; DSP's own page states 'we cannot honor walk-in requests for crash reports.' Mail your request, a copy of the collision information exchange form completed at the scene, and payment to DSP Traffic Operations Section, P.O. Box 430, Dover, DE 19903.

Fee: $25.00 for a standard collision report; $60.00 for a fatal collision report. Payment by check or money order only, made payable to Delaware State Police; DSP's page does not accept cash by mail. Those figures are DSP's own. Under 21 Del. C. § 313(c)(2), each law-enforcement agency sets the fee for its own reports, at an amount that must approximate the cost of producing them, so a municipal police department's charge may differ.

Who may get a copy: Eligibility here is set by statute, not by agency practice. Under 21 Del. C. § 313(c)(1), an accident report may be released only to a person, or that person's legal representative, requesting the person's own report, and to an insurer, insurance support organization, or self-insured entity, including its agent, employee, or contractor, acting in connection with claims investigation activities, anti-fraud activities, rating, or underwriting. Section 313(c)(2) requires the requester to submit proof of identity along with the fee. A journalist, a researcher, or an uninvolved member of the public cannot order a Delaware crash report by mailing the form and a check.

Not a FOIA record: 21 Del. C. § 313(b) provides that accident reports 'are not a public record under the Freedom of Information Act, Chapter 100 of Title 29.' A FOIA request is therefore the wrong vehicle for a crash report and will be denied on that ground. Request the report from the investigating law-enforcement agency under § 313 instead.

Timing: DSP's own page does not publish an exact processing timeline. One statutory limit can extend it considerably: under 21 Del. C. § 313(c)(3), an accident report associated with a criminal prosecution may be withheld from disclosure until that prosecution has concluded. In a fatal or impaired-driving collision that leads to charges, release can lawfully be deferred until the case ends.

How to Get a Delaware Police Incident Report

An incident report for an arrest, theft, or other non-crash matter goes through Delaware's Freedom of Information Act (29 Del. C. ch. 100), submitted to the investigating agency. FOIA is the route for incident reports only: crash reports are handled separately under 21 Del. C. § 313 and are expressly excluded from FOIA, so do not file a FOIA request for one. The crash-specific mail-only rule above does not necessarily apply to a general incident-report request; contact the agency's own records unit to confirm its submission process.

Delaware Code Title 29 § 10002(o)(3), confirmed directly against the statute's text, excludes from the definition of a public record 'investigatory files compiled for civil or criminal law-enforcement purposes including pending investigative files, pretrial and presentence investigations.' A city exemplar: Wilmington runs a GovQA-powered FOIA request portal citing this same statute and the city's own public-access rules.

Delaware Police Bodycam Footage

Delaware Code Title 11 § 8402A, confirmed directly against the statute's text, requires that 'a police officer, a probation and parole officer of the Department of Correction assigned to a law-enforcement task force, and a juvenile probation and parole officer' of the state's youth-services department 'shall wear a body-worn camera while on duty in a role that is likely to result in interactions with the public,' and use it to record those interactions. The section itself is a wear-and-use mandate; the release mechanics live in a companion statute and regulation instead, § 8404(c) directing the development of use and release policies, implemented through 1 Del. Admin. Code § 801-26.0.

For an incident involving death or serious bodily injury specifically, footage is generally held until the Delaware Department of Justice's Division of Civil Rights and Public Trust (DCRPT) has substantially completed any related criminal investigation, key witness interviews are largely finished, and the victim's family has had an opportunity to review the recording, unless DCRPT authorizes earlier release. This DOJ-controlled process governs the highest-severity category specifically; routine footage, an ordinary traffic stop or arrest that does not involve death or serious bodily injury, is understood to run through the general FOIA law-enforcement exemption above, though that specific link was not independently confirmed against a primary DOJ or DSP page during this research pass. See Delaware Police Bodycam Laws and our guide to requesting body camera footage for more.

Corrections and Practical Notes

No Delaware-specific statutory process for correcting a factual error on a crash or incident report was found; contact DSP or the investigating agency directly.

Delaware Code Title 21 § 4203(e) makes clear that a supplemental collision report the state requires is 'without prejudice' and 'shall not be open to public inspection,' and that the fact such a report was filed is admissible only to prove compliance with the reporting duty, not as substantive evidence in a related trial.

For the aftermath of a crash beyond the report itself, see Delaware Car Accident Laws. For the broader public-records framework, see Delaware Public Records Laws and Delaware Court Records. For the general process of filing or reading a report, see How to File a Police Report and How to Read a Police Report.

Disclaimer

This article provides general legal information about how to obtain a police crash report, incident report, or body camera footage in Delaware as verified on 2026-08-11. It does not constitute legal advice and does not create an attorney-client relationship. Readers with a specific records dispute, or who need advice about a specific incident, should consult a lawyer licensed in Delaware.

Last updated: 2026-08-11. Fees and portals reflect their published status as of August 2026.