Communications, CAD/NCIC and records
Radio discipline and plain language, 911 routing and jurisdiction on the air, CAD entries as records, lawful-purpose records and NCIC queries, warrant and hit confirmation, registered-owner inferences, BOLOs, privacy and dissemination, juvenile confidentiality and records retention (SAPC ch. 33, 38 and 39).
Required for Class A Class B Class C Class D Class E Class F
The exam draws 30 questions from a bank of 57. You have 45 minutes, and you need 80% to pass. Questions apply the law to situations. To prepare, read this guide alongside the cited sections of the San Andreas codes, the 2026 Law Enforcement Reform Package and the federal authorities below. The U.S. Constitution binds every San Andreas officer. Supreme Court decisions are binding; federal circuit decisions are accepted authority, and where circuits differ the academy teaches the rule that protects rights more.
The radio is shared by every unit on the channel, and a wasted transmission can cost another officer the second he needs to call for help. Listen before you key so you do not talk over traffic. Think about what you will say, press the button, pause briefly, then speak. Identify yourself by call sign, say who you are calling, and keep each transmission to one idea. COLE teaches plain language: say 'I'm out with two people at Grove Street and Davis Avenue, send a second unit' rather than a string of codes, because plain language works across agencies and in mutual aid, where another agency's codes may mean something different or nothing at all. Use an agency's brevity codes only where that agency has adopted them, and never assume a unit from another agency understands yours. When a unit declares an emergency, everyone else holds traffic until dispatch releases the channel. Officer-safety information comes first and in a fixed order: your location, what is happening, the number of people, any weapons, and what you need. Speak calmly; a level voice tells dispatch and other units more about the danger than a shout does. Acknowledge instructions so dispatch knows you heard them.
Location is the single most important fact you give. State the street and nearest cross street, the postal or a well-known landmark, and, for anything moving, the direction of travel and what you are following. Update it as it changes; a pursuit unit that says only 'still eastbound' is leaving the units ahead of it guessing. Jurisdiction is decided by where the incident is, and dispatch needs that to send the right agency. Route 68 is the line between Los Santos County and Blaine County: north of it is Blaine County Sheriff's Office territory. A 911 call inside a city goes to the city police department only when a city officer is available; otherwise it goes to the county. An officer who acts outside primary jurisdiction under one of the lawful routes, such as fresh pursuit or an emergency, must notify the agency with jurisdiction as soon as practicable (Act VII §7.04, §7.05), and extraterritorial action is reported to the employing agency and the agency with primary jurisdiction (§7.11). Use the radio to make those notifications, and ask dispatch to log them: a notice that was never recorded is hard to prove later.
Everything said on the radio and typed into the CAD is recorded, time-stamped and kept as a government record. It may become evidence, it may be disclosed to the defence, and it may be read aloud in court or played to a jury. Speak and type as though the judge is listening, because one day one will be. Do not broadcast more personal information than the task needs; where a mobile terminal or secure channel is available, use it for dates of birth, addresses and criminal histories. Never use the radio for jokes, insults or comments about the people you deal with. Several offenses protect emergency communications. Knowingly preventing another person from placing an emergency call is SAPC §38.25. Calling 911 for a purpose other than an emergency, including repeated or harassing calls, is §38.27. Knowingly reporting a fire, crime or emergency that does not exist is §38.61. Knowingly making a false emergency report to provoke an armed police response to a location is Swatting (§33.24), a State Jail Felony, rising to a 3rd Degree Felony if someone is injured (§33.25). Possessing a radio receiver capable of monitoring police communications while committing a separate felony is §16.04.
The CAD incident is the official timeline of a call. It records who called, what was reported, which units were assigned, when each was en route, on scene and clear, what was found and how the call ended. Keep your status current: a unit shown available while actually tied up at a scene will be sent elsewhere, and a unit shown on scene that has actually left creates a false record of who was where. Dispatch labels reflect the caller's words, not the facts. Prepare for the risk the call describes, then tell dispatch what you actually found, so the CAD and later reports match reality: a 'loud music' call that turns out to be a woman screaming is updated at once. CAD notes are short factual entries: what you saw, what you did, who is involved and what remains outstanding. Opinions, sarcasm and guesses do not belong there, and nothing in the CAD may be altered or deleted to hide what happened; impairing a genuine government record, or making one you know is false, is Tampering with a Government Record (SAPC §39.02). Close each call with an accurate disposition. The 911 recording and the dispatcher's notes of an emergency in progress are often the strongest evidence in a case, because statements made to resolve an ongoing emergency are generally not testimonial (Davis v. Washington).
Records and NCIC queries are tools for a lawful law-enforcement purpose and nothing else: a stop, a call, an investigation, officer safety, a warrant check, a background check the law requires. Every query is logged against the officer's credentials and audited. Running a name, a plate or an address out of curiosity, for a friend, for a dispute in your private life, or to look up a celebrity, a neighbour, an ex-partner or a colleague is misconduct even when nothing is shared and no harm is intended. When the purpose is to harm or defraud someone, using non-public information obtained through the job is Misuse of Official Information (SAPC §38.73), a 3rd Degree Felony. Obtaining, disclosing or using personal identifying information stored in a computer database without authorization is Electronic Data Breach (§33.05), and using government services or property for personal benefit is Abuse of Official Capacity (§39.04 and higher grades by value). Never lend your login, never let another person query under your session, and never run a query for someone who asks you to 'just check' a name. Serious abuse of authority is also a ground for action against certification (Act III §3.09), and certification follows the officer to any agency.
A hit is a lead, not an arrest warrant in your hand. Before acting on a wanted-person hit, confirm with the entering agency or records that the warrant is still active, that the person in front of you is the person named, and what the warrant allows, including any limit on where the agency will pick the person up. Identity means more than a name match: compare date of birth, physical description, identifying marks, photographs and identifiers, because names repeat and identity thieves use real people's details. While you confirm, the detention must be pursued diligently; a stop is reasonable when police diligently pursue a means of investigation likely to confirm or dispel suspicion quickly (United States v. Sharpe). Records are not always right. Isolated negligent recordkeeping errors by police do not trigger exclusion, but deliberate, reckless or systemic errors may (Herring v. United States), so agencies must clear recalled and served warrants promptly. An officer who arrests on a warrant he knows has been recalled has no lawful basis for the arrest; one who arrests on a record that looks valid but was wrongly left active acts in good faith and lacks the knowledge that SAPC §38.80 requires. When you serve or learn of a recall of a warrant, make sure the record is updated at once.
Vehicle queries follow the same rule: confirm before you act. A plate reader or a typed query can misread a character or confuse similar plates, and a vehicle reported stolen may already have been recovered. Before a high-risk stop on a stolen-vehicle hit, confirm the plate characters, the vehicle's make, model and colour against the record, and the current status with the entering agency where time allows, and tell responding units what has and has not been confirmed. Random, suspicionless stops to check licence and registration are unreasonable (Delaware v. Prouse), but querying a plate displayed in public for a law-enforcement purpose is not a stop. A query result can supply reasonable suspicion. Absent contrary information, an officer may infer that a car's registered owner, whose licence is revoked, is driving it (Kansas v. Glover). The inference ends when facts contradict it: if the owner is a sixty-year-old man and the driver is plainly a young woman, the registration alone no longer suggests the owner is driving. A reasonable mistake of law can support reasonable suspicion (Heien v. North Carolina), but an unreasonable one cannot, and a mistake about facts that a quick look would have corrected is not reasonable.
A BOLO is a broadcast asking other units to look for a person, vehicle or property. A good BOLO gives the offense, when and where it happened, the direction of travel, the clearest description available, any weapon, whether the suspect is wanted or only sought for questioning, and the source of the information and its time. Distinguish confirmed facts from a witness's uncertain impressions. A BOLO is only as good as the facts behind it: officers who stop someone on a BOLO rely on the issuing unit's reasonable suspicion, so the facts and their source must be documented in the CAD. A vague description that fits half the people on the street, such as 'a man in a hoodie', does not by itself justify stopping everyone who matches. Anonymous information needs care. A bare anonymous tip that a person is carrying a gun does not justify a stop and frisk (Florida v. J.L.), while an anonymous tip that accurately predicts future behavior, once corroborated, can (Alabama v. White), and a 911 caller's eyewitness report of being run off the road can give reasonable suspicion of drunk driving (Navarette v. California). Update a BOLO as facts change and cancel it the moment the person or vehicle is found, so that nobody is stopped at gunpoint on a stale broadcast.
Identity checks must be accurate and lawful. A person lawfully stopped on reasonable suspicion who intentionally refuses to give name, date of birth and residence address commits Failure to Identify (SAPC §38.08), and a state may require a lawfully detained person to state his name (Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial District Court), but a person may not be stopped and required to identify himself without reasonable suspicion (Brown v. Texas). A lawfully detained or arrested person who gives a false name, date of birth or address commits Concealment of Identity (§38.15). A record that comes back on a name is not proof that the person in front of you is that person; compare every identifier, and document how you confirmed identity. People whose identities have been stolen can carry warrants and records that belong to someone else; using another person's identifying information without consent to harm or defraud is Fraudulent Use of Identifying Information (§32C.02). When a person says 'that's not me' about a hit, take it seriously, check the photograph and physical description, and if the identifiers do not match, do not arrest on the hit.
Information in police systems belongs to the agency and is released only to people with both a need to know and a right to know. Criminal histories, driving records, addresses, victims' and witnesses' contact details and protective-order information are not shared with friends, family, landlords, employers, the press or the public except through the records unit or public information officer under policy. Never tell one party in a dispute where the other lives, and never give a protected person's address to anyone. Publishing a person's private information, such as a home address, without consent and with intent to harm or harass is Doxxing (SAPC §33.23), whoever does it; an officer who uses information from police systems to harm someone also commits §38.73, and unauthorized disclosure of database information is §33.05. Treat screenshots, photographs of a screen and copied text from a records system as the same record, governed by the same rules. Personal social-media accounts are never a place for booking photos, records, scene photographs or details of investigations. Recording and records rules also protect the public's trust: a person who sees an officer leak a record has every reason never to call the police again.
A child or minor is a person younger than 18 (SAPC §1.37). Juveniles in delinquency proceedings are entitled to notice, counsel, confrontation and the privilege against self-incrimination (In re Gault), and JusticeLink routes a minor's case to juvenile court. As a matter of professional practice, juvenile records carry the strictest confidentiality in the system. They are accessed only for a lawful purpose connected to the juvenile's case or to public safety, shared only with people the law allows, and never posted, forwarded or discussed outside that purpose. A juvenile's name, photograph, address and school are not released to the press, the public or victims' families by the officer; any release goes through the agency's records unit under the law. Status matters such as running away from home (SAFC §51.01) are civil welfare matters handled for the child's protection, not criminal convictions, and must not be described as crimes. Handle juvenile victims' and witnesses' information with the same care. The safest working rule is that nothing about a minor leaves the system except through the people whose job is to release it lawfully.
Think of everything you create on duty as a record that will be kept, requested and read: CAD entries, radio traffic, terminal messages, body-camera and in-car video, photographs, notes, emails and work messages, including those on a personal phone used for work. Retention schedules set by law and agency policy say how long each kind of record is kept; follow them exactly, and never delete or purge early because a record is embarrassing or inconvenient. When an investigation, complaint, lawsuit or prosecution is pending or reasonably expected, related records are held regardless of the normal schedule. Destroying or concealing a record or thing knowing an investigation or proceeding is pending is Tampering with Evidence (SAPC §38.19), and destroying, concealing or impairing a genuine government record is §39.02. The prosecution is responsible for favorable evidence known to anyone acting on its behalf, including police (Kyles v. Whitley), so a radio recording or CAD note that helps the defence must be preserved and disclosed like any other evidence. Failing to preserve potentially useful evidence violates due process only when police act in bad faith (Arizona v. Youngblood), but good faith is the minimum, not the goal. Correct errors with a dated supplement; never rewrite history in the record.
Constitution and case law
The federal authorities this module's questions rely on, and the rule the academy takes from each.
Ready to sit it? Open your character's academy file from the COLE page.