ONLINE POLICE REPORTS - FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

The CORP system is intended for non-emergency incidents in which the suspect is not known.  So, if you or someone else saw who did this, or any person, animal, or property is in immediate danger call 9-1-1 immediately!

Please use the on-line reporting service for the following crimes:

• Destruction of Property
• Identity Theft
• Theft up to $500
• Car Prowl up to $1500
• Theft of Automobile Accessories up $1500
• Drug dealing and other illegal narcotics activity

Some crimes and incidents may require evidence collection or other investigative procedures requiring an officer’s involvement. Also, only crimes that have no suspects, are not in progress and do not involve injury can be reported this way. This is for the safety of everyone involved.

Yes, you may file a Narcotics Activity Report (NAR) through the CORP system. NARs document your direct observations of suspicious circumstances likely involving the use, sale, manufacture, transportation, or delivery of illegal drugs. Examples include:

• Suspicious persons apparently selling drugs on the street corner
• Marijuana grow operations
• Shipment of packages believed to contain illegal drugs
• Clandestine drug manufacturing (e.g., Meth labs)

Among others, CORP is NOT appropriate for the following crimes or incidents:

• Incidents occurring within past 30 minutes
• Violent crimes, completed or attempted
• Sex crimes, completed or attempted
• Theft or loss of a firearm
• Theft or loss of prescription drugs or other controlled substances.
• Stolen vehicles, completed or attempted
• Stolen license plate
• Burglary of your home or business (completed or attempted)
• Crimes committed due to race, religion, ethnic or national origin, disability and/or sexual orientation
• Aggressive driving
• Traffic collisions
• Check fraud
• Noise complaints
• Lost property
• Civil disputes

If your incident isn’t eligible for online reporting or if you would like to speak directly to an officer, call the Seattle Police Department’s non-emergency number, 206-625-5011. You may also go to any one of our five Seattle Police Precincts during desk hours and report the incident in person.

No. If a crime took place outside of the City of Seattle please call the police department for that area.

There is one exception to this: Identity Theft. If you are a resident of Seattle, Identity Theft can be reported to Seattle Police no matter which city or where in the world it occurred.

Identity theft occurs when someone uses your personal information to fraudulently generate a new financial account.  This is the only form of this offense eligible for online reporting.  Cases where someone fraudulently uses your existing credit or financial account (e.g., someone makes an online purchase using your credit card account number) are Credit Card Fraud and are not eligible for online reporting.  Similarly, Wire Fraud and Check Fraud are not eligible for online reporting. Please call 206-625-5011 to enquire about other means of filing fraud reports.

If someone steals your wallet or mail, you can report that theft of a physical item using the Community online Reporting Program.  Choose Theft (Misdemeanor) and follow the prompts to complete your report, being sure to list the wallet or mail in the Property section.  If the stolen credit or ATM cards were used to commit fraudulent transactions you may include that information in the Incident Description section of your report.  However, such subsequent fraudulent transactions constitute a separate crime of Fraud which can only be reported to an officer by calling
206-625-5011.

No.  When you or someone else knows the person, where to find the person, has a detailed description of the person who committed the crime, or even the license plate number of the vehicle the suspect(s) were in - this is considered a known suspect. Reports with a known suspect require investigation by an officer, either in person or by phone.

If a firearm or another type of weapon was involved, then the incident requires a police officer to personally gather the information. Please call the Seattle Police Communications Center 9-1-1 or non-emergency 206-625-5011 to have a police officer dispatched to you.

No. Washington State Law requires any law enforcement officer of the state, county, city, town, or other political subdivision to report each vehicle collision resulting in injury or death of any person, or damage to the property of any one person to an apparent extent of $700 or more. Unattended Hit and Run collisions are not eligible for online reporting, even if the damage value is under $700.

For collisions with damage under the reporting threshold of $700, and not involving a Hit and Run, drivers may file a Citizen's Report with the Washington State Patrol.

You must use a Javascript-enabled web browser to access this site. You also must have cookies enabled, and pop-up blockers disabled. Certain user information is recorded in order to aid in the prosecution of false police reports. For more information on how your data is used, please read The City of Seattle Privacy Policy.

If you have a strong junk email/spam filter, you will also want to add SPD-CORP@seattle.gov to your contact list to reduce the likelihood that notifications are not rejected. You should not respond to this email address, as it is NOT monitored by an officer for the purpose of investigative follow-up. 

Filing a CORP report online is the easiest way to get a free report to submit to your insurance agency. When you file a report with CORP, it will be reviewed. Unfortunately these types of crimes usually have limited solvability so most cases will not be investigated.

Making a CORP report also helps SPD fight crime in the following ways:

• it may assist in the identification and return of stolen property recovered as the result of other investigations,
• it helps SPD get accurate statistics on these types of crimes,
• it provides information that helps the Department make decisions about when and where officers are deployed

Normally, you will receive a response from the CORP reviewer within five business days. In the meantime you will be given a temporary transaction number to document your submission.  This temporary number is not your police report number.  Police report numbers are only issued and e-mailed to you once your report has been reviewed and approved.

You will be given a chance to print a copy of your CORP report submission at the end of the filing process. It is strongly suggested that you print that submission and write the final police report number on it when you receive approval via e-mail. Certain police reports and more information can be found at our Online Police Reports web page.

You will have the ability to file online supplemental reports.  You will need the temporary transaction (a T followed by eight digits) of the original CORP-filed report, or the police report number you received when your report was taken by an officer, or approved online.  The police report number will begin with the year of the report followed by six digits (e.g., 2010-000017).

If you have already filed a report through the online system, we strongly encourage you to continue to update and add information through this system, rather than also filing through other methods, such as calling 9-1-1. This decreases the risk of filing the same report twice, and also makes it easier to keep your information tied to the correct report number.

If you have already filed a report and realize you need the report approved quicker than 5 days - you can do that by calling the non-emergency number 206-625-5011 and asking to file the report with the Communications Section. Be sure to tell them you have already filed the same report through the online reporting system, and give them the temporary transaction number you were provided when you filed the report online so they may include it in the narrative of your report.

If you have any questions, or problems with, the Community Online Reporting Program please contact the CORP Coordinator at SPD-CORP@seattle.gov, or call 206-684-4587. 

If you have determined that online reporting is not right for you at this time but you still want to file a report, please call the SPD Communications non-emergency line at 206-625-5011.