How To Obtain an Accident Report in Dallas, TX

Texas uses a fault-based auto insurance system. Under this system, you must prove fault to recover injury compensation after a car accident. To prove fault, you need evidence showing how the crash happened and who was responsible for causing it.

An accident report can provide valuable leads to your Dallas personal injury attorney for gathering this evidence. The crash report will describe the accident and tell you which drivers received traffic citations as a result of the accident. It will also give you a list of witnesses who can testify if you need to go to court.

If you need help with a car accident claim in Dallas, reach out to Anderson Injury Lawyers at (817) 294-1900. We offer a free initial consultation where you can discuss your case with an experienced attorney.

How Anderson Injury Lawyers Can Help After a Car Crash in Dallas, TX

How Anderson Injury Lawyers Can Help After a Car Crash in Dallas, TX

Anderson Injury Lawyers is a premier personal injury law firm serving Dallas, Texas, accident victims since 2007. Our Dallas car accident lawyers include an attorney with board certification in personal injury trial law from the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. Our award-winning attorneys can help you with any type of car accident case in the area.

When you hire us to help you, we provide the following:

  • A free consultation to discuss your accident and your legal options
  • A team of lawyers with decades of experience handling cases like yours
  • A record of successfully recovering hundreds of millions of dollars for injured clients

A car accident can leave you with massive medical bills and disabilities that prevent you from earning a living. That’s one reason why our attorneys work for a contingency fee; you can hire us without paying anything upfront. While you rest and recover from the accident, we’ll work hard to secure a favorable settlement or verdict on your behalf. 

Contact Anderson Injury Lawyers for a free consultation to discuss your injuries and the financial compensation you can seek under Texas law.

How Many Accident Reports Are Prepared Every Year?

Texas requires drivers to report all crashes that cause:

  • Death
  • Injury
  • Damage that renders a vehicle undrivable

Drivers must contact the local police if the crash happens within city limits. If it happens outside city limits, they must contact the county sheriff’s office or the Texas Highway Patrol.

After receiving notification of a car accident, police agencies in Texas have the authority to investigate and produce an accident report for all crashes involving:

According to Texas’s 2021 traffic crash statistics, the state had:

  • 4,060 fatal crashes
  • 163,317 non-fatal injury crashes
  • 384,847 property damage only (PDO) crashes

This means police officers in Texas prepared at least 167,377 crash reports in 2021. Since Texas’s property damage threshold is so low, officers may have prepared as many as 552,224 accident reports that year.

Using the 2021 crash statistics for Dallas, you can make a similar calculation. Officers prepared at least 11,085 crash reports for fatal and non-fatal injury accidents. They may have prepared as many as 35,355 crash reports once you add the PDO crashes from that year.

Steps for Obtaining a Crash Report in Texas

When officers investigate your crash, they will interview those involved and any bystanders who witnessed it. They will often measure skid marks and angles and take pictures of the accident scene.

The information collected during the investigation will go into a written accident report. This report is not admissible in court because it contains hearsay. But it can lead your injury lawyer to admissible evidence.

For example, if you were injured in a rear-end collision, the accident report might state that the police issued a citation for tailgating to the driver who hit you. This can then lead your lawyer to the case file for the traffic ticket and give them the legal foundation to ask the driver about the ticket in court.

Only certain people are entitled to get an official copy of an accident report, including:

  • People involved in the crash
  • Parents of a minor involved in a crash
  • Owners of property or vehicles damaged in the accident
  • Anyone permitted to sue for wrongful death due to the accident
  • Lawyers and insurers for any of the above people

The agency that investigated your crash will determine how to obtain an accident report in Dallas, TX:

Texas Highway Patrol

The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) collects accident reports from every agency in the state, including the Texas Highway Patrol. The TxDOT crash reports online purchase system is the only source for highway patrol accident reports.

To buy a copy of a report from TxDOT, you must certify you are entitled to obtain a crash report. You must identify the crash and pay a fee. TxDOT will email the crash report to you.

Dallas County Sheriff’s Office

If the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office investigated your crash, you could buy a crash report through the TxDOT online system. You can also request a copy of the report by mail or in person at the sheriff’s office.

Dallas Police Department

You can request accident reports from the Dallas Police Department through the TxDOT system, by mail, or in person at the Dallas Police Department headquarters. Officers typically complete crash reports within five to seven days after the accident.

Schedule a Free Consultation With Our Car Crash Lawyer in Dallas, TX

An accident report can provide essential information for your injury case. Contact Anderson Injury Lawyers to discuss how our car crash lawyers in Dallas, TX can use your crash report to pursue injury compensation.

Common types of car accident claims we handle include:

Additional Dallas Car Accident Resources