How To Get Your Pennsylvania Crash Report
(And How To Read It)
First: which agency responded?
This determines everything about how you get the report. Pennsylvania State Police handle crashes on the interstates and in the many Luzerne County municipalities without their own force. Larger municipalities — Wilkes-Barre, Hazleton, Kingston, Pittston, Nanticoke and others — have their own departments, and each sets its own process and fee.
If you are not sure, the officer's card, the incident number, or the municipality where the crash occurred will tell you.
Getting a State Police report
Reports are generally available 15 days after the crash. The fee is $22.
Online: use the Pennsylvania State Police crash report request portal. You can search by incident number, or by name and date of the crash, then pay and receive the report by email.
By mail: complete and sign Form SP 7-0015, 'Application to Obtain Copy of Police Crash Report,' and send it with a certified check or money order for $22 payable to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to the PSP Crash Reports Unit, 1800 Elmerton Avenue, Harrisburg, PA 17110.
Not everyone is allowed to get one
Pennsylvania's Vehicle Code limits access to people involved in the crash, their attorney, their insurer, and certain government agencies. The general public cannot request someone else's crash report. If you were not involved, you will need written authorization from someone who was.
What if the police never came?
This happens more often than people expect, particularly for crashes that look minor at the scene. If your crash involved injury, death, or a vehicle damaged badly enough to require towing, and no officer investigated, Pennsylvania law requires you to file your own report with PennDOT within five days using Form AA-600, the Driver's Report of Traffic Crash. Failing to file can affect your driving privilege.
A self-report carries less weight with insurers than an officer's report, but having any contemporaneous official record is far better than having none — particularly if symptoms appear a week later.
What is actually on the report
A Pennsylvania crash report identifies each vehicle as a numbered 'unit,' and includes the date, time and location, road and weather conditions, a diagram, a narrative, coded contributing factors, citations issued, and a witness list. The witness list is often the most valuable part and the part people overlook.
Read it carefully as soon as you get it. Errors in vehicle position, direction of travel, or which unit is which are not rare, and they are much easier to address early.
The report is not the final word on fault
An officer arrives after the fact and reconstructs events from physical evidence and from what people say in the first stressful minutes. The resulting opinion about fault is generally not admissible as proof of who was responsible, and a jury never simply adopts it.
Insurers nonetheless treat the report as a starting point, which is why an inaccurate one is worth correcting. If something is wrong, contact the investigating agency and ask about a supplemental report — bring documentation rather than just a disagreement.
Talk it through with someone local. If you have questions about your own situation, the attorneys at Joyce, Carmody & Moran can review what happened and explain your options — no cost for the first conversation, and no obligation. We are based in Pittston and handle injury matters throughout Luzerne County.
Let’s Work Together
When you work with us, you can expect clear communication, thoughtful strategy, and a team that is fully invested in your goals. We take the time to understand your needs, tailor our approach, and stand with you through every step of the legal process. Let’s move forward — together.