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Department profile · Middlesex County

Spotswood Police Department

Reported as: Spotswood PDMunicipal police

Jurisdiction context

Not a civil service jurisdiction

This department is not among the NJCSC Appendix A jurisdictions, so major discipline here follows a different statutory track (generally N.J.S.A. 40A:14 for municipal police), with appeals that usually go to the Superior Court rather than the Civil Service Commission.

See the context on non-civil-service departments.

Reflects the NJCSC Appendix A roster as of 2026-07-04. Context only, not legal advice.

In brief

Spotswood Police Department, a municipal police agency in Middlesex County, reported 2 officers named in internal affairs cases in 2025 and 2 investigations, a rate of 100 per 100 officers. Both the Middlesex County median of 125 and the 125.9 statewide municipal median were higher. A rate under the median can point to fewer complaints or to fewer of them being documented, and neither reading is settled by the data. Of the 2 investigations detailed for 2025, 1 reported sustained complaints. The allegations recorded were Improper Entry and Preventable MV Accident.

No major discipline records appear in the 2020-2025 releases, and the absence of records is not a finding. Spotswood received a D on the report card, at the 70th percentile among 171 peers in the 15-29 officers group, a medium-confidence grade.

Written by this site strictly from the figures on this page; every number is cited below.

Officers named in IA cases, 2025

2[1]

Distinct officers in that year's IA investigations, not total staffing

IA investigations, 2025

2[1]

Incidents, 2025

2[1]

Major discipline records

0

All years, 2020-2025

Staffing

As reported by the department to the FBI's Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) census, full-time personnel as of October 31 each year. This is a different measurement from the "officers named in IA cases" figure above; see the methodology.

Sworn officers, 2025

23[6]

59 years reported

23 sworn officers in 2025, up from 7 in 1965 (+229%).
Yearsworn officers
19657
1966not reported
1967not reported
19689
196912
197013
197115
197215
197316
197418
197518
197618
197718
197818
197917
198018
198118
198218
198318
198418
198520
198619
198719
198819
198917
199018
199118
199218
199318
199418
199519
199618
199719
199819
199919
200018
200118
200218
200319
200419
200519
200619
200719
200819
200919
201019
201119
201219
201320
201419
201520
201621
201722
201826
201924
202025
202125
202225
202323
202423
202523

Civilian employees, 2025

5[7]

0.22 per sworn officer

Female sworn officers, 2025

1[8]

4.3% of sworn officers

Officers per 1,000 residents, 2025

2.76[9]

Municipal departments only

AnalysisComputed by this site from LEE reported totals; not an official statistic.

How Spotswood Police Department's sworn staffing compares with its real peer group (same agency type, similar size band), not an assumed bell curve.

Peer group: Municipal police, 15-29 officers (n=166)

Sworn officers: Municipal police, 15-29 officers
RangeAgencies
14–1617
16–1820
18–2027
20–2217
22–2425
24–2624
26–2817
28–3019

Spotswood Police Department: 23 sworn officers: 61st percentile among Municipal police, 15-29 officers (n=166).

The match between this FBI record and this department is this site's inference, not a certified mapping. If it is wrong, we will remove it: corrections.

Officer pay and school-staff pay

County comparison

A separate dataset from the discipline records above: NJ Treasury pension salaries as of March 31, 2026, for the 23 active Spotswood Police Department officers in the file.

Median officer salary

$110,606[2]

23 active officers

Median local school staff

$80,948

SPOTSWOOD BD OF ED, 169 TPAF members

Against the local district

1.37x

Median officer to median local school staff

Against the county

1.25x

Median officer to Middlesex County school-staff median

AnalysisEvery ratio here is computed by this site from as-reported pensionable salaries. The local school figure comes from the pension employer "SPOTSWOOD BD OF ED", linked to this municipality only because exactly one district in the county resolves to it. A pay comparison is not a statement about either budget. The full county comparison, including the distribution and the tenure-adjusted figure, is on the Middlesex County pay page.

Military surplus equipment (1033 program)

No 1033 transfers recorded. No surplus-equipment transfers appear for this agency under a high-confidence name match in the Defense Logistics Agency's file as of 2026-06-30. That can mean the agency received nothing through the program, or that a recipient name in the federal file did not confidently match this department. See the methodology for how the match is made, or the statewide 1033 overview for how the program spreads across New Jersey.

Internal affairs investigations by year

counts

Internal affairs investigations reported by Spotswood Police Department, by year
Categorycounts
202120
202226
202313
202420
20252

Incidents

2 in 2025

Internal affairs incidents reported by Spotswood Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
202120
202226
202313
202420
20252

Officers on IA rows

2 in 2025

Officers listed on the officer-level internal affairs rows for Spotswood Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
2021not reported
2022not reported
2023not reported
202419
20252
Analysis

Computed by this site from the two figures the agency reports each year. Not a misconduct rate: it describes how an agency resolved what it investigated.

share of total · 5 reported years

Share of internal affairs investigations sustained by Spotswood Police Department, by year
Yearshare of total
20210
202215.385
20237.692
202415
202550

Statewide, 19.5 percent of investigations reported a sustained complaint in 2025. How dispositions break down statewide.

Complaint mix, 2025

Most serious allegation per investigation, as categorized by the reporting agency. Officer-level rows list 2 officers involved.

Most serious allegation

Most serious allegations reported by Spotswood Police Department, 2025
Improper Entry1
Preventable MV Accident1
AdministrativeConduct / dutyRights / integrityViolence / criminal

Statewide category pages: Improper Entry · Preventable MV Accident

Internal disposition

Internal dispositions reported by Spotswood Police Department, 2025
Exonerated1
Sustained1

Allegations by year, 2021 to 2025

AnalysisRanked and folded by this site. The counts inside each panel are as reported.

Demeanor

20 of 81

Demeanor allegations reported by Spotswood Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20214
20229
20234
20243
20250

Differential Treatment

12 of 81

Differential Treatment allegations reported by Spotswood Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20216
20225
20231
20240
20250

Other Departmental Rule Violation

12 of 81

Other Departmental Rule Violation allegations reported by Spotswood Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20217
20224
20230
20241
20250

Excessive Force

8 of 81

Excessive Force allegations reported by Spotswood Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20213
20221
20230
20244
20250

Other (11 categories)

29 of 81

Other (11 categories) allegations reported by Spotswood Police Department, by year
Yearcounts
20210
20227
20238
202412
20252

Against peers, 2025

How this grade was built →
Internal affairs investigations per 100 IA-investigated officers, 2025 (investigations per 100 IA-investigated officers)
Spotswood Police Department100.0
County median, municipal police (25)125.0
NJ median, municipal police (445)125.9

Investigations per 100 officers named in that year's IA investigations (the Attorney General's own "Number of Officers" field, a distinct-officer count drawn from the IA case data itself, not a department headcount). A higher number is ambiguous on its own: it can reflect more misconduct, or a stronger internal reporting culture. Medians are computed within the same agency type only.

AnalysisA second, independent rate using FBI-reported staffing instead.

2 investigations reported for 2025[1] ÷ 23 sworn officers the department reported to the FBI for 2025[21] = 8.7 per 100 FBI-reported sworn officers. This is a genuinely different denominator from the rate above, not a correction of it; the two should not be added or averaged together. See the methodology for why these two officer counts diverge.

Report card

Grade D: Second-highest fifth

On reported IA volume and discipline severity; see methodology

Combined standing
70th percentile of 171 peers
Confidence
Medium confidence
  • small agency; per-officer rates swing widely on a handful of cases

Where this agency falls among its peers

The actual spread of discipline severity across Spotswood Police Department's real peer group, not an assumed bell curve. If the group is skewed, it is shown skewed.

Peer group: Municipal police, 15-29 officers (n=171)

Discipline severity: Municipal police, 15-29 officers
RangeAgencies
0–50120
50–10024
100–15015
150–2007
200–2503
250–3002

Spotswood Police Department: 0 severity-weighted discipline per 100 IA-investigated officers: 25th percentile among Municipal police, 15-29 officers (n=171).

How the grade is built

Three components, each a percentile within the peer group. The combined standing is their weighted mean, re-ranked among peers; the grade is the fifth of the peer group it lands in.

IA volumeweight 40%

88th percentileof 171 peers

143.6 investigations per 100 officers (multi-year mean)

Internal affairs investigations per 100 reported officers, averaged over the years where the agency reported both figures.

Discipline severityweight 40%

25th percentileof 171 peers

0.0 severity-weighted discipline per 100 officers, 2020-2025

Major discipline records weighted by sanction (termination 4, demotion 3, suspension 2, other 1) per 100 officers.

Allegation severityweight 20%

77th percentileof 171 peers

2.42 mean severity tier (1 low - 4 critical)

Mean severity tier of IA allegations across 2021-2025, using the published tier map; unknown values excluded.

What this grade can and can't tell you

  • The underlying data is self-reported by agencies, one yearly snapshot at a time.
  • Allegations are not findings; many complaints end unfounded, exonerated, or not sustained.
  • There is no arrest or call-volume denominator in this data, so nothing here is a per-capita misconduct rate. A genuinely independent staffing-based rate, sourced from the FBI rather than this grade's own data, appears above when available. It is a different measurement, not a more accurate version of the grade.
  • A higher internal affairs volume is ambiguous: it can indicate more misconduct, or a more robust oversight and reporting culture. The grade weighs it anyway, because volume is what the record offers; that choice is published, not hidden.
  • The grade is one lens. The records it reads are on this page above.

Where this agency ranks

AnalysisRankings compare agencies of the same type only, on figures as reported. A high rank is reported volume, not a verdict.[22] How each metric is defined.
This agency's rank on each metric, among agencies of the same type
MetricValueRank
IA per 100 investigated officers2025100.0322nd of 445 municipal police
IA investigations20252376th of 445 municipal police
IA incidents20252364th of 445 municipal police
Sworn per 1,000 residentslatest reported census year2.76149th of 460 municipal police
Police pay vs school paypension snapshot 2026-03-311.25x276th of 415 municipal police
OPRA requests recordedOPRAmachine, 2017 to present23143rd of 458 municipal police

Major discipline records

No major discipline records appear for this agency in the 2020-2025 releases. Absence of records is not a finding; see the methodology for what this data does and does not cover.

Public records requests

Records requests about this department filed through OPRAmachine, an independent site that files Open Public Records Act requests in public and publishes the responses.[3] This is a third-party, user-generated source, separate in origin from the Attorney General records elsewhere on this page.

Current as of 12 July 2026. These figures are a point-in-time snapshot and do not update: requests filed to OPRAmachine after that date do not appear here. For live activity, see this body on OPRAmachine.

This department has no separate listing on OPRAmachine. Records requests for it are handled through Spotswood Borough, the municipal records custodian, which also fields requests about permits, property, and code enforcement. Only the 23 requests whose subject line indicates it concerns the police department are counted below. The other 165 filed to Spotswood Borough are about something else and are not shown.

Police-related requests

23[3]

Identified by subject line, of 188 filed to Spotswood Borough

Most recent request

February 2026[3]

First recorded March 2019

Awaiting a response

13[3]

Requests with no response recorded yet

What happened to those requests

Statuses as recorded on OPRAmachine. They are set by the person who filed the request when they classify what came back, not by the agency and not by any court. They describe the fate of a records request and nothing else.

Recorded outcomes of police-related records requests to Spotswood Borough (requests)
Awaiting agency response13
Requester reported success6
Requester reported partial success2
Agency said records not held2

Recent requests

The 12 most recent police-related requests to Spotswood Borough, by date and recorded status. Each was written by a member of the public. A request is a question somebody asked. It is not a finding, not an allegation this site makes, and not evidence that anything happened.

  1. 2026-02-04Requester reported partial success
  2. 2025-12-30Requester reported success
  3. 2025-10-05Requester reported success
  4. 2025-09-16Requester reported success
  5. 2025-02-13Awaiting agency response
  6. 2024-09-28Awaiting agency response
  7. 2024-08-28Awaiting agency response
  8. 2024-01-04Awaiting agency response
  9. 2023-08-31Awaiting agency response
  10. 2023-08-31Awaiting agency response
  11. 2023-03-02Awaiting agency response
  12. 2023-01-17Agency said records not held
Show what each request asked for, as the requester wrote it

These titles are quoted from OPRAmachine exactly as the requester typed them. They are the requester's words, not this site's, and some describe what the requester believed or suspected. Nothing here has been established as fact.

File your own records request

Anyone can request records from this municipality under the Open Public Records Act. This link opens a request on OPRAmachine, pre-filled with a neutral starting point you can edit or replace before you send it. The request, and any response, will be published there.

File an OPRA request about this department

See every request filed to Spotswood Borough on OPRAmachine.

What this section can and can't tell you

  • A request is not a finding. Every entry records what a member of the public asked for. None of it establishes that an agency did anything, and none of it is an allegation this site is making.
  • Statuses come from the requester, not the agency. On OPRAmachine the person who filed the request classifies the response they got, so “successful” means they said they got what they asked for. It is not the agency's word and not an adjudication.
  • Request volume is not a measure of misconduct. A long list usually reflects public interest, local journalism, or one determined requester. A short list usually means few people have asked.
  • This covers OPRAmachine only. Most OPRA requests in New Jersey are filed directly with agencies and never appear here, so this is a floor, not a total.
  • It is frozen at 12 July 2026. The figures come from a snapshot of OPRAmachine taken on that date and nothing refreshes them, so anything filed since is missing. Treat every number here as a lower bound that is only getting further out of date.
  • The count is an undercount, by design. Requests to Spotswood Borough are sorted by subject line, because that custodian also handles permits, property, and code enforcement. A request that is genuinely about the police but carries a vague subject line, and many do read only “OPRA Request,” is not counted here. The sorting is this site's own reading of the request titles, not a fact from the source, and it is deliberately cautious: it would rather miss a police request than show you somebody's building permit.

The match between this OPRAmachine body and this department is this site's inference, not a certified mapping. If it is wrong, we will remove it: corrections.

Questions and answers

What is a summary of Spotswood Police Department's internal affairs and discipline record?

Spotswood Police Department, a municipal police agency in Middlesex County, reported 2 officers named in internal affairs cases in 2025 and 2 investigations, a rate of 100 per 100 officers. Both the Middlesex County median of 125 and the 125.9 statewide municipal median were higher. A rate under the median can point to fewer complaints or to fewer of them being documented, and neither reading is settled by the data. Of the 2 investigations detailed for 2025, 1 reported sustained complaints. The allegations recorded were Improper Entry and Preventable MV Accident. No major discipline records appear in the 2020-2025 releases, and the absence of records is not a finding. Spotswood received a D on the report card, at the 70th percentile among 171 peers in the 15-29 officers group, a medium-confidence grade.

How many internal affairs investigations did Spotswood Police Department report in 2025?

Spotswood Police Department reported 2 internal affairs investigations in 2025, according to New Jersey Attorney General data. 2 distinct officers were named in that year's IA investigations.

How many major discipline records does Spotswood Police Department have?

No major discipline records appear for Spotswood Police Department in the Attorney General's 2020-2025 releases. Absence of records is not a finding; discipline is listed only after all appeals conclude.

How many officers does Spotswood Police Department have?

Spotswood Police Department reported 23 full-time sworn officers to the FBI's Law Enforcement Employees census for 2025, 4.3% of them female. That is 2.76 sworn officers per 1,000 residents. This is a different measurement from the "officers named in IA cases" figure elsewhere on this page, which counts distinct officers in that year's internal affairs investigations, not total staffing.

What does Spotswood Police Department pay its officers compared with local school staff?

The median pensionable salary for the 23 active Spotswood Police Department officers in the NJ Treasury pension file is $110,606. The median for the 169 TPAF-enrolled staff at SPOTSWOOD BD OF ED is $80,948, a ratio of 1.37x. Against the Middlesex County school-staff median the ratio is 1.25x. These are pensionable base salaries: they exclude overtime, stipends, longevity and leave payouts for both groups, and a school contract year and a police work year are different lengths. TPAF covers certificated school staff, not only classroom teachers.

Sources

  1. [1]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 2328. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  2. [2]YourMoney Active Pension Members (PFRS/SPRS subset) and YourMoney Active Pension Members (TPAF subset, names removed). New Jersey Department of the Treasury. Both snapshots as of March 31, 2026. Derived from the public YourMoney Active Pension Members dataset, https://www.yourmoney.nj.gov/. Figures are computed by this site from as-reported pensionable salaries; the row-by-row account of what entered each figure is published at /data/pay-comparison.json. ↩
  3. [3]Records-request activity for Spotswood Borough. OPRAmachine (opramachine.com), an independent public-records platform. Publicly visible requests only. Point-in-time snapshot taken 2026-07-12 from a database export dated 2026-07-11. Not updated after that date; see opramachine.com for current activity. ↩
  4. [4]New Jersey Internal Affairs Officers, 2024-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Officer counts summed across every Spotswood PD row. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  5. [5]New Jersey county boundaries. New Jersey Office of Information Technology, Office of GIS (NJOGIS). NJ_Counties_3857 (FeatureServer layer 0), https://services2.arcgis.com/XVOqAjTOJ5P6ngMu/arcgis/rest/services/NJ_Counties_3857/FeatureServer/0. 2020 boundary delineation. Retrieved 2026-07-27. Boundaries are generalized for display. This data set is not a survey document and must not be used as such. The polygons do not represent legal boundaries.
  6. [6]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8411. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  7. [7]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8411. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  8. [8]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8411. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  9. [9]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8411. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  10. [10]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 293. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  11. [11]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1311. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  12. [12]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1816. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  13. [13]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 797. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  14. [14]New Jersey Internal Affairs Agency Totals, 2021-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 2328. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. ↩
  15. [15]New Jersey Internal Affairs Investigations, 2024-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Spotswood PD row for 2025; row 1 is the header. ↩
  16. [16]New Jersey Internal Affairs Data Download, 2021-2023. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Spotswood PD row for 2021. ↩
  17. [17]New Jersey Internal Affairs Data Download, 2021-2023. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Spotswood PD row for 2022. ↩
  18. [18]New Jersey Internal Affairs Data Download, 2021-2023. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Spotswood PD row for 2023. ↩
  19. [19]New Jersey Internal Affairs Investigations, 2024-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Spotswood PD row for 2024. ↩
  20. [20]New Jersey Internal Affairs Investigations, 2024-2025. New Jersey Office of the Attorney General. Sheet "Sheet1", row 1. Snapshot retrieved 2026-06-09. Aggregated from every Spotswood PD row for 2025. ↩
  21. [21]FBI Law Enforcement Employees (LEE), New Jersey subset. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Row 8411. Derived from the public Law Enforcement Employees (LEE) / Police Employee Data dataset (1960-2025), https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/. ↩
  22. [22]Ranks computed by this site over the Attorney General internal affairs agency totals and major discipline releases, within agency type. Each ranking page lists every agency and its source rows. ↩