Can a lawyer obtain the crash report and any preliminary or incident report from the responding officer?

Which Report Can a Lawyer Request?

The driver exchange form provided at the scene is generally not the complete crash report. It usually contains basic information such as the drivers’ names, vehicle details, insurance information, and a report or event number.

For a reportable North Carolina collision, the investigating officer prepares a written crash report, commonly called a DMV-349. Under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-166.1, law enforcement crash reports are public records open to inspection, and the DMV may provide a certified copy upon request and payment of the required fee.

A lawyer can normally request the DMV-349 from:

• The police department, sheriff’s office, or State Highway Patrol unit that investigated the collision;
• The agency’s records division or online records system; or
• The North Carolina Division of Motor Vehicles after the report has been submitted.

The request is easier to locate when it includes the collision date, location, drivers’ names, investigating agency, officer’s name, and report or event number. The driver exchange form often provides several of these details.

Are Preliminary Notes and Incident Reports Available?

Possibly, but these materials are treated differently from the completed DMV-349. Depending on what occurred, an officer’s file may contain field notes, a hand-drawn diagram, photographs, witness information, measurements, recorded statements, dispatch information, body-camera footage, or a supplemental report. Not every collision produces all of these records.

A request is usually directed to the agency’s records division rather than informally to the responding officer. The agency may release some records, redact protected information, delay release, or deny access under an applicable law.

For example, N.C. Gen. Stat. § 132-1.4 provides that records compiled for a criminal investigation are not automatically public records, although certain basic information remains public and a court may order disclosure in an appropriate situation. This can matter if the crash involved a citation, suspected impaired driving, serious injury, or another possible offense.

A lawyer can identify the available records, make focused requests, follow up with the records custodian, and evaluate whether another legal procedure is justified. Prompt requests are important because some video, dispatch, and other electronic material may be overwritten under agency retention practices.

Can Inaccurate Information in the Crash Report Be Corrected?

A lawyer cannot personally rewrite the officer’s report. The lawyer can, however, contact the investigating officer or agency and provide objective information supporting a correction or supplemental report. Useful supporting material may include:

• Photographs or video showing the traffic signal, vehicle positions, or collision scene;
• Names and contact information for independent witnesses;
• Vehicle damage photographs and repair documentation;
• Dash-camera or nearby surveillance footage;
• The driver exchange form and insurance correspondence;
• A clear written explanation identifying the disputed entry; and
• Records showing that a name, vehicle, insurance, road, or other factual detail was entered incorrectly.

It helps to distinguish a factual error from a disputed conclusion. An incorrect license plate number or road name may be relatively straightforward to document. A disagreement about who entered an intersection on a red light usually requires witness accounts, video, physical evidence, and a review of the full circumstances.

The officer may decline to change the original report, especially when the dispute concerns competing driver statements. In some situations, the agency may attach a supplement rather than replace the first report. Even if no change is made, the additional evidence can still be presented to an insurer or used in a later legal proceeding.

The Crash Report Does Not Control the Insurance Decision

A DMV-349 is an important starting point, but it is not the entire investigation. An officer may have arrived after the impact and may have relied on limited or conflicting statements. The report should be compared with photographs, videos, witness accounts, vehicle damage, citations, signal information, and any supplemental materials.

An insurer makes its own liability assessment. Therefore, correcting a report does not automatically change an insurance decision, and an insurer’s fault assignment does not by itself determine what a court would decide. A lawyer can submit additional evidence and ask the insurer to reconsider, but no particular response is guaranteed.

Fault disputes are especially important in North Carolina because contributory negligence may be raised as a defense. If the defense proves that the injured person’s own negligence helped cause the collision, that finding can create serious problems for the injury claim. The party asserting that defense generally carries the burden of proof under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 1-139. Evidence should therefore address both why the other driver was at fault and why the injured driver acted reasonably.

How This Applies to the Reported Red-Light Collision

Here, the individual says the other driver ran a red light, while the individual’s insurer later assigned fault to the individual. The first step is to obtain the complete DMV-349 and determine whether a supplemental or incident report exists. The driver exchange form can help identify the agency and report number.

The report should then be checked for the officer’s diagram, contributing circumstances, listed witnesses, driver statements, citations, and any notation about the traffic signal. Because the insurer reached a conflicting conclusion, it is also important to obtain the written basis for that decision and preserve all adjuster correspondence.

If the report contains an objective mistake, a documented correction request may be appropriate. If it reflects a disputed account rather than a clerical error, the stronger approach may be to develop independent evidence instead of relying only on an amendment request. Claim discussions with an insurer do not automatically extend the deadline for filing a lawsuit, so the report dispute should not be allowed to consume the time available to protect a claim.

Information to Gather for the Records Request

Before asking a lawyer to obtain or review the records, preserve:

• The driver exchange form;
• The date, time, and exact location of the collision;
• The officer’s name, badge number, agency, and report number, if known;
• Photographs, videos, and witness contact information;
• Insurance claim numbers, letters, emails, and fault determinations;
• Vehicle repair estimates and damage photographs; and
• Medical records, bills, and visit summaries if an injury claim is involved.