West Virginia Police Report: How to Get a Crash Report, Incident Report, or Body Camera Footage

West Virginia is one of the states in this cluster with no general confidentiality statute governing police crash reports. That is not a recent gap. The provision that once filled that role was repealed in 1998, and nothing of general application has replaced it at the state level since.

That structural fact shapes how both crash reports and incident reports work in West Virginia: both run through the same general public-records exemption in the state's Freedom of Information Act, rather than through separate, dedicated rules.

Information last verified on 2026-08-10. This article has not yet been reviewed by a licensed lawyer.

Getting a Copy of a West Virginia Crash Report

West Virginia State Police's Traffic Records Section handles crash report requests using a Criminal and Crash Report Request Form (WVSP Form 141) rather than a dedicated online purchase portal. The form lists three separate fee options, each its own line item, not a base fee plus a certification surcharge: $20.00 for a mailed copy, $25.00 for a certified copy, or $25.00 for a fax-only copy. A requester ordering a single certified copy pays only the $25.00 certified-copy line. Payment can be made by certified check, business check, or money order payable to "Superintendent, West Virginia State Police," or by providing credit card information on the form itself. Mail the completed form to WV State Police Traffic Records Section, 701 Jefferson Road, South Charleston, WV 25309-1698, or call 304-746-2128 with questions. Some local agencies in West Virginia route their own crash-report requests through BuyCrash.com, the LexisNexis-hosted platform several states use, though that is agency-specific rather than a statewide system.

The legal backdrop here is unusual. West Virginia's state-level crash-report confidentiality provision, W. Va. Code 17C-4-13, was repealed by the legislature in 1998 (Acts, 1998 Regular Session, Chapter 316), and the statute now reads only "Repealed," with no preserved text. That is not a fresh currency risk. It has been the status quo for more than 25 years. With no general replacement confidentiality clause at the state level, crash-report access runs through the general FOIA law-enforcement exemption covered below, the same framework governing any other law-enforcement record.

One narrow confidentiality provision does remain on the books, and it is worth knowing what it does and does not reach. W. Va. Code 17C-4-15 allows any incorporated city, town, village, or other municipality to require by ordinance that a driver involved in a crash file a report with a designated city department, and it provides that "All such reports shall be for the confidential use of the city department." That rule attaches to the driver-filed municipal report created under such an ordinance, not to the officer-prepared crash report a requester ordinarily seeks from a responding agency, so it does not change the practical access route described here.

A common assumption is worth correcting directly: West Virginia's version of the federal Driver's Privacy Protection Act, the Uniform Motor Vehicle Records Disclosure Act (W. Va. Code Chapter 17A, Article 2A, enacted in 1996), does not cover crash reports. Its definitions section, 17A-2A-3(f), states plainly that "personal information does not include information on vehicle accidents, driving or equipment related violations and driver's license or registration status." Accident information is affirmatively carved out of that statute's protection, so it cannot be relied on as the source of any crash-report confidentiality in West Virginia.

Getting a Copy of a West Virginia Police Incident Report

A general incident report, covering an arrest or another non-crash police response, is requested directly from the department or sheriff's office that handled it, under the West Virginia Freedom of Information Act. W. Va. Code 29B-1-4 lists the Act's 23 numbered exemptions, and subsection (a)(4)(A) is the operative one for police records: it exempts "records of law-enforcement agencies that deal with the detection and investigation of crime and the internal records and notations of such law-enforcement agencies which are maintained for internal use in matters relating to law enforcement." As with West Virginia crash reports, this same exemption is the governing standard, applied case by case depending on whether an investigation is open and how sensitive the record is.

West Virginia Body Camera Footage

West Virginia has no standalone body-worn camera statute. Requests for footage are handled under the same general FOIA law-enforcement exemption, 29B-1-4, that governs crash and incident reports, rather than a dedicated access law with its own fee schedule or retention rule. A related provision, W. Va. Code 62-1A-12, carves law-enforcement dash and body cameras out of the state's private-property surveillance-camera restriction, but that section addresses recording consent, not public access to the footage afterward, so it does not fill the gap either.

For a broader comparison across states, see How to Request Body Cam Footage and West Virginia Body Camera Laws.

Related Resources

Police Reports by State covers the full 50-state picture. See also How to File a Police Report, How to Read a Police Report, Are Police Reports Public?, West Virginia Body Camera Laws, West Virginia Car Accident Laws, West Virginia Public Records Laws, and West Virginia Court Records.

Disclaimer

This article provides general information about how to request police crash reports, incident reports, and body camera footage in West Virginia. It is not legal advice. Fees, portals, and statutes change; confirm current details with West Virginia State Police, the responding agency, or a West Virginia attorney before relying on anything here for a specific situation.

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Last updated: 2026-08-10. Fees and portals reflect their published status as of August 2026.