Texas accident report: where to get your copy

Where a Texas accident report is kept

Texas keeps its crash reports in one place. Every police agency in the state sends its reports to one office, the Texas Department of Transportation, and TxDOT sells them from one website. TxDOT calls itself the custodian of crash records for the state of Texas. It collects reports from Texas law enforcement agencies for crashes on public roads and on the state highway system.

So the first answer is the same in Houston, in a small town and on an interstate. Go to TxDOT's Crash Report Online Purchase System, search for the crash and buy the report. The official name of the document is the Texas Peace Officer's Crash Report, Form CR-3.

The second answer depends on the department. Some Texas police agencies still hand out their own reports through a records office. Others have stopped and now point to the state site. The table in the next section sets them side by side.

Texas police agencies side by side

Each line below comes from that agency's own page. Where a department says nothing about a fee or a wait, the cell says so.

Read on the pages named in the table on 12 November 2026. A trooper's report and a Houston officer's report are both in the TxDOT system in the meantime, because every agency files there.

Finding out which agency wrote your report

You do not have to know before you search. TxDOT's search works from a name, and the results can show you the agency. Hover over the Quick View icon next to a result and it lists the agency and that agency's case ID along with the county, the city and the date.

It still helps to know, for two reasons. If the report is slow to appear, the agency is the one to ask whether it has been sent in. And if you want the department's own copy, you need the right records office. If the officer gave you a slip or a card at the scene, look there for the department's name and its case number. San Antonio police ask for that case number when you have it. When you do not, they ask for two or more of these: the date, the location, the names of the people involved, and a short description of what happened. For a common name they also want a date of birth.

The Texas calendar, from the crash to the copy

Most of the waiting in Texas comes from a handful of fixed periods. Put in order, they look like this.

Two of those lines surprise people. The first is the electronic check. It costs less, because Texas.gov adds no fee to it, but the report is held until the payment clears. If you need the report this week, pay by card. The second is the redacted copy. A copy with personal details hidden is reviewed by TxDOT before release, so it is not instant even when you pay by card.

What a Texas accident report costs

A certified copy carries the State of Texas seal, in San Antonio's words. TxDOT's page describes it as the copy to ask for when a person needs an official document, such as for a legal proceeding. For your own files, or to read what the officer wrote, the regular copy is the same report.

San Antonio police take cash, credit cards, money orders and checks at their headquarters. Their page says requests made online or by mail may be paid by check or money order sent by post.

Who may get a Texas report

Texas sells two versions of the same report. A redacted copy, with personal information hidden, is sold to anyone. The full copy is released under Transportation Code 550.065 to any person directly concerned in the accident or having a proper interest in it. TxDOT's page names the people involved, their authorized representatives, the drivers and their employers, parents or guardians, the owners of damaged vehicles or property, and the insurance companies behind any vehicle or person in the crash, among others.

When you choose the full copy, the site asks you to certify which of those you are. A person who does not meet the criteria receives a redacted copy. The TxDOT CRIS page goes through that screen and the full list.

Asking a police department instead of TxDOT

There are reasons to go to the department. You may want other records from the same incident. You may want to pay at a counter. Or the report may be old. Two large departments spell out how.

San Antonio Police Department

San Antonio police accept crash report requests three ways. Online, you open the City's Open Government Portal, create an account, fill in the request and choose how to receive the documents: by email, by US mail, or in person at SAPD headquarters. By mail or in person, you fill in the department's form named Police Crash Reports and send or bring it to the San Antonio Police Department Records Office, 315 S. Santa Rosa, San Antonio, TX 78207. The department reviews the request, retrieves the record and tells you by the method you picked. Crash reports have their own form. Other police records use a second form.

Dallas Police Department

The Dallas Police Records Section lists accident (CR-3) reports and insurance related copies among its services, next to offense and incident reports. Requests can go in online through the City of Dallas Open Records Portal, by mail or in person, and the section asks you to allow 5 to 10 business days. It also offers report verification, which is a confirmation of a report number, for people who are not sure theirs is right. The section warns that not all reports are available online. The Open Records Unit is at 1400 Botham Jean Blvd., Dallas, Texas 75215.

Fort Worth and Austin

Fort Worth police changed course on December 15, 2024 and now send requesters to the state purchase site. Their page keeps one local line open. If the report is not on the state site after 14 days, the Police Records unit at 817-392-4160 will help. Austin police sell crash reports for their jurisdiction online through LexisNexis Police Reports.

When it goes wrong

The search finds nothing

Check the date first. Inside 14 days, the report may simply not be in the system yet. After that, the agency that investigated can tell you whether it was sent. If TxDOT truly has no report, its site will issue a Certified Letter of No Crash Record without charge.

You lost the case number

You do not need it for the state search. A first and last name is enough to start, and a county, a city or a date narrows the list. Dallas police will confirm a report number through their records section.

Something on the report looks wrong

TxDOT keeps and sells the report. It did not write it. The place to raise a mistake is the agency whose officer investigated the crash. Dallas police make a related point about their own records: reports reflect the information given at the time, and classifications are preliminary and can change as an investigation develops.

The crash was years ago

TxDOT keeps reports for 10 years plus the current year. San Antonio police hold reports from before 2011 in an archive away from the office. Those take longer to retrieve and may cost more.

If no officer came

An officer's report is required when a crash involves an injury, a death, or $1,000 or more in damage to one person's property. A smaller crash may have no CR-3 at all. Texas used to keep a report that drivers filled in themselves, Form CR-2, but TxDOT stopped retaining it on September 1, 2017. It tells drivers who were handed that form, or a similar local one, to keep it for their own records.

Reading a Texas report

A CR-3 is filled with boxes and number codes. This site covers where to get it. For what the codes mean, FairSettlement.org has a guide to every one: how to read a Texas crash report.

Texas pages on this site

• AgencyTxDOT crash reports (CRIS)The statewide sale of every Texas police crash report: the search, the two kinds of copy and the payment holds.
• Agency · with launchHouston Police Report

More Texas departments are added as each one is checked against its own pages.

Texas accident report questions