How to get police and traffic camera video of a crash in Arkansas

The public records law that gets you the video

Arkansas Freedom of Information Act of 1967 (FOIA), Ark. Code Ann. 25-19-101 to 25-19-112

Now, or 3 working days if in use/storage

Public records include “writings, recorded sounds, films, tapes, electronic or computer-based information, or data compilations in any medium” kept by an agency that record its official functions, and everything kept in public offices or by public employees within the scope of their employment is presumed public (Ark. Code Ann. 25-19-103(15)(A)). Except as a law specifically provides otherwise, public records are open to inspection and copying, including still and moving photography and video recording, by “any citizen of the State of Arkansas” during the custodian’s regular business hours (25-19-105(a)(1)(A)); access is denied to a person convicted of a felony who is incarcerated, and to that person’s representative other than an attorney (25-19-105(a)(1)(B)). The Attorney General’s handbook says “citizen” includes corporations and that the requester’s purpose is irrelevant; the State Police and Little Rock Police both say the person making the request must be an Arkansas citizen. How to ask: in person, by telephone, mail, fax, email or other electronic means the custodian provides, specific enough for the custodian to locate the records with reasonable effort (25-19-105(a)(2)); a written request is advisable because it gives you a record, the handbook says. Deadline: a record that is not in active use or storage must be provided immediately; the statute refers to the custodian’s “obligation” “to immediately provide to the requestor any responsive records not in active use or storage” (25-19-105(a)(6)). If a record “is in active use or storage and therefore not available at the time a citizen asks to examine it, the custodian shall certify this fact in writing to the applicant and set a date and hour within three (3) working days at which time the record will be available” (25-19-105(e)); the handbook reads this as “records must be made available immediately unless in active use or storage, in which case they must be made available within three working days of the request.” (The Attorney General’s FOIA web page puts it more loosely, saying government entities “generally have up to three business days to provide a record”; the statute’s three working days apply to records in active use or storage.) Since 2023 Act 879, a custodian must answer a written request in writing within that time if no records exist, if records are exempt (naming the exemptions), or if it lacks control of the records (naming the right custodian if known), and a custodian who knowingly fails to do so faces the FOIA’s penalties; this does not delay records that are not in active use or storage, which must be provided immediately (25-19-105(a)(3) to (6)). Exempt parts must be cut out and the rest released, with the amount deleted indicated, at the custodian’s cost (25-19-105(f)). Fees: copies may cost no more than actual reproduction costs, not including existing staff time to search, retrieve, review or copy, plus actual mailing or transmission costs; the custodian may require advance payment of an estimated fee over $25.00, may waive or reduce fees for noncommercial requests in the public interest, must itemize charges, and may not charge for inspection (25-19-105(d)(3)). Video has its own rule, below (25-19-112). Negligently violating the FOIA is a Class C misdemeanor (25-19-104).

Police body camera and dashcam video

FOIA governs; fee caps in 25-19-112

Arkansas has no statute that sets special release rules for ordinary crash video from police dashcams or body cameras; the general FOIA governs it, with its exemptions (25-19-105(b)), including the one for undisclosed investigations (below). The only video-specific release statute we found covers recordings of an officer’s death: a photograph, video or audio recording, “including any audio or video footage captured on a body-worn camera or a dashboard camera,” that depicts or records the death of a law enforcement officer is confidential and exempt from the FOIA, open to listed family members, and otherwise available only by circuit court order on good cause (Ark. Code Ann. 12-6-701). Fees for video: since 2021, a state, county, city, school, college or university law enforcement agency, dispatch center, 911 answering point, jail, detention center or electronic record provider may charge for retrieving, reviewing, redacting and copying audio, visual and audiovisual media as 25-19-112 provides. A request that takes three hours or less of personnel and equipment time must be provided at no charge, except for the cost of reproducing the media, unless you or your entity made a request under that section in the preceding 30 days; a request that takes more than three hours may be charged at a rate that does not exceed $20.00 per hour, prorated, for each hour of running time of the media provided to you; if the job is estimated to take more than three hours, prepayment may be required; and the request must be specific enough for the custodian to locate the media with reasonable effort (25-19-112(c)). So name the date, time, location, case or crash report number, and the officers or units if you know them. Retention: the FOIA is not a records-retention law. In Daugherty v. Jacksonville Police Department, 2012 Ark. 264, the Arkansas Supreme Court agreed that “there is no specific retention period for public records” in the FOIA and affirmed a finding that a police department did not violate the FOIA by purging patrol car audio and video under its 45-day policy, while quoting an Attorney General opinion that destroying records after a FOIA request has been made could violate the Act. That case predates a 2021 retention rule for county sheriffs: a sheriff’s office must keep audio, visual and audiovisual media for at least 30 days, and media in an investigative case file for at least 3 years if it is associated with a misdemeanor, a violation or a civil or other noncriminal matter, 10 years for a felony other than Class Y, and 30 years for a Class Y or Class A felony (Ark. Code Ann. 13-4-403, as amended by 2021 Act 778). We found no video retention statute for city police or the State Police (the municipal schedule in 14-2-204 lists accident, incident and offense reports but not video), so request the video, in writing, as early as you can. Where to send it: the Arkansas State Police takes FOIA requests at ASP.FOI@asp.arkansas.gov and directs crash report requests to its Crash Records Section; Little Rock Police, for example, takes FOIA requests through its online portal and may ask for prepayment when copying costs exceed $25.00.

When police can hold video back

Open criminal probe files exempt

The FOIA does not make open “Undisclosed investigations by law enforcement agencies of suspected criminal activity” (Ark. Code Ann. 25-19-105(b)(6)). Documents protected from disclosure by order or rule of court are also exempt (25-19-105(b)(8)). The statute does not say when the investigation exemption ends. The Attorney General’s 2026 handbook summarizes the courts this way: records that are part of an open and ongoing law enforcement investigation are protected as undisclosed investigations, and whether an investigation is open and ongoing “is a question of fact in each case” (Martin v. Musteen, 303 Ark. 656 (1990)); sparse activity after two years on a decades-old case was not enough to show an open investigation (Dep’t of Ark. State Police v. Keech Law Firm, 2017 Ark. 143); not every law enforcement record is investigative enough to qualify (Hengel v. City of Pine Bluff, 307 Ark. 457 (1991)); there is “no bright-line rule” for when an investigation is closed after an arrest but before trial (Op. Att’y Gen. 2002-303); and a State Police investigation must be disclosed once it is closed, not continuing and not part of a larger investigation (Op. Att’y Gen. 90-305). So crash video can be withheld while the agency is investigating suspected criminal activity connected to the crash and the investigation remains open, and you can ask again once it is closed. Whatever the agency withholds, it must still release any reasonably segregable, nonexempt part of a record (25-19-105(f)), and a written denial of a written request must name the exemptions it relies on (25-19-105(a)(3)(B)).

Do traffic cameras in Arkansas record?

ARDOT: live only, not recorded

The Arkansas Department of Transportation’s traffic cameras feed its traveler site, IDrive Arkansas, and ARDOT says plainly that they do not record. Its Traffic Camera Terms of Use say: “ARDOT does not record or store traffic camera images. Live feeds are available for monitoring real-time road conditions, but past footage is not archived,” and that the feed carries no time or date stamp. The IDrive Arkansas privacy policy says: “Video produced by the TRAFFIC CAMERA feature of the site is not recorded or archived.” ARDOT also says some cameras shown on IDrive Arkansas belong to adjacent states, cities and commercial television stations, which own those images, and that it will not reposition a camera for an event such as a crash. So ARDOT is unlikely to have video of your crash, but a camera owned by a city or a television station might have been recording under its own practice; if the camera nearest the crash carries another owner’s logo, ask that owner right away. ARDOT’s requested-information page tells you to call its Public Information Office, Monday to Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., at (501) 569-2227. Recordings a city keeps from its own traffic or intersection cameras would be public records under the FOIA’s definition, so a FOIA request to the city is the route.

Red-light and speed cameras

Speed cameras: school, rail, work zones

Arkansas restricts automated speed enforcement. An “automated enforcement device” is a system that uses a device capable of detecting a speeding violation and photographs or records an image of the vehicle, its operator or its license plate; a county, a city or a state department may not use one to enforce state traffic laws or city ordinances except in a school zone, at a railroad crossing or in a highway work zone, and when one is used a certified law enforcement officer must issue the citation to the violator at the time of the violation (Ark. Code Ann. 27-52-110, 27-52-111, as amended by 2023 Act 707). The Arkansas Highway Police may use such devices to enforce motor carrier laws (27-52-110(d), 27-52-111(d)). Retention is limited by statute: a city or state department may not keep device data that is not related to an issued traffic citation or warning or an active criminal or civil investigation (27-52-111(e)), and a county or state department operating outside a city may not keep data not related to an active criminal or civil investigation (27-52-110(e)). These sections address only speed detection; we found no Arkansas statute that authorizes red-light cameras. School buses: a school district or open-enrollment charter school may install cameras that record vehicles illegally passing a stopped school bus, and must provide that video for use as evidence in a criminal or civil proceeding for a school bus passing offense when an investigating law enforcement agency requests it (6-19-131). We found no statute that gives a crash victim a special right to automated camera images; they would be requested under the FOIA if the agency kept them.

If your request is denied

Circuit court; hearing within 7 days

The FOIA has no administrative appeal and no ombudsman for a denied records request. “Any citizen denied the rights granted to him or her by this chapter may appeal immediately from the denial” to circuit court: the Pulaski County Circuit Court or the circuit court where you live if a state agency is involved, or the circuit court of the appropriate judicial district for a county, city, township, school district or publicly funded private organization (Ark. Code Ann. 25-19-107(a)). On your written application, the court must set a hearing within seven days of the date of the application and decide the case; anyone who refuses to obey the court’s order is in contempt (25-19-107(b), (c)). If, after you sue, you obtain a significant or material portion of the records, the court must award you reasonable attorney’s fees and litigation expenses unless the agency’s position was substantially justified; fees cannot be assessed against the state, but a plaintiff who substantially prevails against a state agency may file a claim with the Arkansas State Claims Commission within 60 days of the final disposition of the appeal (25-19-107(d), (e)). The statute lets you appeal “immediately” and sets no filing deadline that we found. The Attorney General’s FOIA opinion procedure in 25-19-105(c)(3)(B) covers only personnel and employee-evaluation records, not police video. Before suing, it helps to have the agency’s written answer naming the exemption it relies on (25-19-105(a)(3)) and to ask it in writing to preserve the video while you dispute the denial.

What to do now

1. 1

   Send a FOIA request today

   Email or file a written request with the agency that worked the crash for all dashcam and body camera video, giving the date, time, place and report number.

2. 2

   Ask the agency to keep the video

   The FOIA sets no retention period, a 45-day purge was upheld, and sheriffs need keep most video only 30 days. Ask in writing that it be preserved.

3. 3

   Check other cameras now

   ARDOT does not record its highway cameras, so ask the city or TV station that owns any nearby camera, and post the crash on the bounty board for nearby dashcam footage.

4. 4

   If denied, go to circuit court

   Get the written denial naming the exemption. You may appeal immediately to circuit court, which must set a hearing within 7 days of your written application.

Frequently asked questions