Where internal affairs activity concentrates in New Jersey

Essex County reported 2,953 internal affairs investigations in 2025, more than any other county in New Jersey.^[1] Camden followed with 2,404.^[1] At the other end, Salem County reported 66 and Warren reported 100.^[1] The gap is large, and most of it is not mysterious.

Size explains most of the gap

Counties with more officers report more investigations. Essex reported 1,593 sworn officers across its agencies in 2025; Salem reported 38.^[1] More officers doing more police work produce more complaints and more internal reviews. A raw county total is close to a population and staffing count wearing a different label.

That is why a bare ranking of counties by investigation volume is not a ranking of anything you would call misconduct. It mostly tells you where the officers are.

What size does not explain

A few things survive the size adjustment and are worth noticing.

The first is concentration inside a county. Essex County's total is driven heavily by a handful of large departments: Newark alone reported 978 investigations in 2025, with East Orange and Irvington next.^[1] A county number is an aggregate of very different departments, and the aggregate can hide as much as it shows.

The second is major discipline, which follows a different pattern from investigation volume. Camden County recorded 455 major discipline records across 2020 to 2025, the most of any county, more than Essex despite Essex reporting more investigations.^[2] Much of Camden's total comes from its county corrections department, which is a reminder that discipline and investigation volume measure different things and concentrate in different places.

How to read the county pages

Every county profile on this site lists its agencies with their own numbers, so you can see what sits behind the county total rather than stopping at the aggregate. The investigation counts are yearly snapshots as reported by each agency. They are not per-capita rates, and a higher count can reflect either more misconduct or a more active internal affairs process.

The useful comparison is rarely county against county. It is a department against departments doing the same job at a similar size, which is what the rankings and report cards are built to show.