Reviewed and updated October 9, 2026 by the SearchSystems.net editorial team. The arrest counts are the ones each agency reported to the FBI, as the FBI held them on October 8, 2026. The jail figures are from the Vera Institute of Justice's Incarceration Trends data. Every office link was opened and checked against the office's own site on September 23, 2026.
Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, has about 563,000 residents (2024 Census Bureau estimate), and arrests there are reported to the FBI by the Lancaster County Sheriff's Office, 25 city agencies and seven campus, state or other agencies. An arrest leaves the same records whoever makes it: the arresting agency's report, the record of anyone held at the county jail, and, if the District Attorney files charges, a case in the Lancaster County Court of Common Pleas. This guide says who keeps each one, what it costs and who may see it, with the arrest counts each agency reported.
This guide covers who makes arrests, how many arrests, booking and the jail, finding an arrest, copies, cities and common questions.
Related guides: Lancaster County public records, Pennsylvania arrest records, Pennsylvania inmate search and Pennsylvania criminal records.
Who Makes Arrests in Lancaster County
The Lancaster County Sheriff's Office is the county agency that reports arrests to the FBI for Lancaster County. It reported 48 arrests for 2025.
Arrests inside 13 of the county's cities are reported to the FBI by an agency of the city's own, listed here with the Census population and what each reported, the largest twelve first; the rest are named in the cities section below:
- Lancaster, 58,441 residents: 3,133 arrests reported for 2025.
- Lancaster (township), 58,441 residents.
- Ephrata, 13,719 residents: 424 arrests reported for 2025.
- Elizabethtown, 11,993 residents: 245 arrests reported for 2025.
- Columbia, 10,399 residents: 282 arrests reported for 2025.
- Lititz, 9,733 residents: 115 arrests reported for 2024.
- Millersville, 9,290 residents: 152 arrests reported for 2025.
- Mount Joy, 8,364 residents: 162 arrests reported for 2024.
- Manheim (township), 5,011 residents: 1,852 arrests reported for 2025.
- Manheim, 5,011 residents: 215 arrests reported for 2025.
- Strasburg, 3,099 residents: 9 arrests reported for 2025.
- Quarryville, 2,867 residents: 135 arrests reported for 2019.
A city on that list is reported separately whether the officers are the city's own or the sheriff's under contract; the FBI's list does not say which.
The FBI's agency list also places these agencies in Lancaster County: Franklin and Marshall College and Millersville University (campus police); Lancaster County Detectives Drug Task Force (other); the State Park Rangers at Susquehannock, the Bureau of Forestry in Lancaster County and the Office of Attorney General Region 2 in Lancaster County (state agency); the Lancaster County State Police (state police).
How Many Arrests Each Agency Reports in Lancaster County
The FBI publishes every agency's monthly arrest counts on the Crime Data Explorer. These are the full-year totals, all offenses, as the FBI held them on October 8, 2026; a year with months missing or not reported is left out.
- Lancaster: 3,133 for 2025 and 5,267 for 2019; 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024 are missing months.
- Manheim (township): 1,852 for 2025, 1,150 for 2024 and 1,057 for 2023.
- East Lampeter Township: 626 for 2025, 655 for 2024, 601 for 2023, 569 for 2022 and 1,066 for 2020; 2021 is missing months.
- Northern Lancaster County Regional: 512 for 2025, 384 for 2024, 436 for 2020 and 287 for 2019; 2021, 2022 and 2023 are missing months.
- Ephrata: 424 for 2025, 586 for 2024 and 289 for 2020; 2021, 2022 and 2023 are missing months.
- Columbia: 282 for 2025, 435 for 2024 and 382 for 2020; 2021, 2022 and 2023 are missing months.
- West Lampeter Township: 266 for 2025 and 332 for 2024.
- Elizabethtown: 245 for 2025, 358 for 2024, 258 for 2023 and 129 for 2020; 2021 and 2022 are missing months.
- West Hempfield Township: 244 for 2025 and 265 for 2024.
- Northwest Lancaster County Regional: 232 for 2025 and 265 for 2024.
- Manheim: 215 for 2025, 254 for 2024, 224 for 2020 and 440 for 2019; 2021, 2022 and 2023 are missing months.
- West Earl Township: 164 for 2025, 183 for 2024 and 95 for 2020; 2021, 2022 and 2023 are missing months.
Together, the 18 agencies with all twelve months of 2025 on file reported 8,587 arrests that year. The 16 of them with both 2025 and 2024 complete reported 3,602 in 2025 against 4,242 in 2024, down 15 percent.
Through April 2026, the 14 agencies with every month so far on file reported 2,363 arrests, against 2,608 in the same months of 2025.
East Hempfield Township, Mount Joy, Lititz, Quarryville and four more reported only part of 2025 (11 months, 11 months, 11 months and 10 months) and are left out of the totals.
Booking: Where People Arrested in Lancaster County Are Held
The county jail is where a person arrested in Lancaster County and kept in custody ends up, whichever agency made the arrest, though a city department may hold someone in its own cells first and a person cited and released at the scene is never booked. The jail's record of each person held, with the charges, is a public record of the arrest, and once the person is released or sentenced the record continues in the court file.
On an average day in 2024 the jail held about 740 people, down from about 780 in 2019. Its rated capacity in 2023, the last year with a capacity figure, was 1,085 beds, and it ran at 70 percent of it that year. The figures are from the Vera Institute of Justice's Incarceration Trends data.
SearchSystems opened and checked the custody page of the Lancaster County Sheriff's Office at co.lancaster.pa.us/756/Whos-In-Jail (page title: Who's In Jail? | Lancaster County, PA), phone 717-299-7800, which answered when SearchSystems opened it on September 23, 2026.
That page is the place to look for someone who was booked recently; a person cited and released at the scene, or held only a few hours by a city department, will not be on it.
A sentence of more than a year is served in state prison; the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections lists its inmates at inmatelocator.cor.pa.gov.
How to Find Out About an Arrest in Lancaster County
An arrest in Lancaster County can be traced in three places, depending on where the case stands: the custody page of the Lancaster County Sheriff's Office described above, for anyone booked into the county jail; UJS Web Portal, the Pennsylvania courts' free statewide docket search, which shows whether charges were filed; the District Attorney, which decides whether an arrest becomes a charge (its page is at co.lancaster.pa.us/1492/District-Attorney, phone 717-299-8100).
Pennsylvania is one of the states that lets anyone look up another person's statewide criminal history: PATCH lets anyone request a criminal record check by name online, for $22 a search, through the Pennsylvania State Police. That record shows what agencies reported to the state, which is wider than one county's court index but can lag it.
Getting a Copy of an Arrest Record in Lancaster County
The report of an arrest is released by the agency that made it; the jail and the court hold their own records of the same event, but not the report. Under the Right-to-Know Law the agency must answer within 5 business days, with a 30-day extension, and it may charge copying at 25 cents a page.
- An arrest by the Lancaster County Sheriff's Office: ask its records unit, reached through the office at 717-299-7800.
- An arrest in Lancaster, Lancaster (township), Ephrata, Elizabethtown, Columbia, Lititz or another of the cities listed above: the records unit of the agency that reports for that city; the city guides linked above name each city's records office.
- An arrest by Franklin and Marshall College, Lancaster County Detectives Drug Task Force or Millersville University: the records office of the agency involved.
- A defendant who has been charged gets the report through the case: the District Attorney, 717-299-8100, handles discovery for pending cases.
- Any county record that is not posted: the county records request page SearchSystems verified is at lancastercountypa.gov (page title: Form Center, County of Lancaster Open Records Request Form).
- Your own statewide record: the same request described above, for your own name.
Cities in Lancaster County: Who Reports the Arrests
The FBI lists a separate arrest reporting agency for 13 of the 19 cities in Lancaster County: the twelve named above and Christiana. New Holland, East Petersburg, Akron, Denver, Mountville, Marietta, Adamstown and Terre Hill have no separate reporting agency in the FBI's list. The FBI's list also carries the East Lampeter Township Police Department, the East Hempfield Township Police Department, the West Lampeter Township Police Department and nine more as city agencies in Lancaster County; East Lampeter Township, East Hempfield Township, West Lampeter Township and nine more are not among the cities above.
Wherever in the county the arrest happens, a person kept in custody goes to the county jail and the case goes to the Lancaster County Court of Common Pleas.
SearchSystems has a guide to the offices of these cities in Lancaster County, with the 2024 Census Bureau population; a city with its own arrest records guide opens there:
- Columbia (10,399)
Frequently Asked Questions
How many arrests are made in Lancaster County each year?
Lancaster reported 3,133 arrests to the FBI for 2025, and the 18 agencies with every month of 2025 on file reported 8,587 between them.
How do I find out if someone is in jail in Lancaster County?
Look on the custody page of the Lancaster County Sheriff's Office at co.lancaster.pa.us/756/Whos-In-Jail, or call 717-299-7800. It covers people booked into the county jail.
Where are people arrested in Lancaster County booked?
Those kept in custody go to the county jail, run by the Lancaster County Sheriff's Office; a person cited and released at the scene is not booked.
Are arrest records public in Lancaster County?
The court files of criminal cases are public, and so is the statewide criminal history kept by the Pennsylvania State Police: PATCH lets anyone request a criminal record check by name online, for $22. The arrest report itself is released by the agency that made the arrest, under the Right-to-Know Law.
How do I get a copy of an arrest report in Lancaster County?
From the agency that made the arrest: the Lancaster County Sheriff's Office for its own arrests, or the agency that reports for the city where it happened. Under the Right-to-Know Law the answer is due within 5 business days, with a 30-day extension; the county records request page SearchSystems verified is at lancastercountypa.gov.
Is this the official Lancaster County website?
No. SearchSystems.net is an independent public records guide, online since 1997. It links to the official county, court and state offices described above and does not hold records, charge for them or take requests.