A wealth of information about police agencies’ internal affairs investigations is now available online in a searchable dashboard capable of filtering data by law enforcement agency, the types of allegations involved, and what, if any, disciplinary action was taken.
It is believed to be the most comprehensive compilation of statewide internal affairs information to be made accessible to the public by any state in the U.S.
The Attorney General’s Office of Public Integrity & Accountability (OPIA) believes the dashboard will serve as a tool for both law enforcement and the public, revealing the prevalence of various accusations, where they are surfacing, and how they are being dealt with by the internal affairs review process.
The dashboard, available at www.njoag.gov/iapp, represents an unprecedented and ambitious effort by the Attorney General’s Office to gather de-identified internal affairs information that had been scattered among hundreds of agencies — information that had not previously been collected in a uniform way, or shared with the public in a standardized format or central location.
The numbers now listed on the dashboard show the internal affairs cases active in 2021. The Office of Justice Data will update the statistics on an annual basis as new information is submitted by police agencies around the state. Dashboard refinements are also being planned for 2022 that will enable a viewer to better understand how specific complaints are adjudicated, including whether an allegation started as one type of offense but was resolved as a lesser infraction.