At the beginning of every blotter (or blotter extract) will be the following disclaimer statement:
"This blotter (or extract) is a daily chronological record of police activity developed from
reports, complaints, incidents, or information received and the actions resulting therefrom. Entries
contained on the blotter may not be completely accurate and are not adjudications attesting to the guilt
or innocence of any person."
(2) The first entry will always be at 0001 hours and indicate "Blotter Opened" and the
Summary of Action Taken will be "Information." The final entry on the blotter will read "Blotter
Closed" at 2400 hours.
(3) The first column to the left shows the entry number. The numbers are in a chronological
order when typed into the blotter. The second column is the time the entry was typed in by the desk
clerk. This is not when the incident occurred. There may be a time lapse from the time the incidence
was reported to the MP desk and the time the incident was typed in the blotter. You can see in Figure 1-
4 that the time for entry number 2 was 0140. In the Summary of Complaint column, the time listed is
0025 hours. The difference in time in this example is one hour and fifteen minutes between when the
incident occurred and the time the entry was typed in the blotter.
(4) The Summary of Complaint column is the main body of the blotter. Each entry begins
with the type of complaint or offense and the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) code. This
information will be the same as the MP report form, DA Form 3975. This will be discussed later in the
subcourse. After the offense and code is typed in, the information on the subjects involved in the
incident is specified. The subject is listed first with the details as to name, rank/grade, sex, race, age,
Social Security Number (SSN), and unit or address. The victims, witnesses, and complainants are then
listed with the same format as the subject.
(5) Details included in the blotter will vary with each incident. As you can see in Figure 1-4,
entry number 2 is a traffic accident. In this case, vehicles and damage estimates are listed. The location
of the accident is shown along with the name of the MP who was dispatched to investigate.
(6) Under the heading DETAILS, is a short, concise narrative of what happened. This is a
chronological sequence of events. It includes the why, what, and how of the incident. When you are
reviewing the blotter, be sure the details match the incident and complaint. Most of the time, you will
see all the
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