Jail space continues to be an issue in Greene County.

Sheriff Jack Williams recently shared a report of the total number of inmates that were booked into the county jail from 2017 and 2018. In 2017, there were a total of 470 inmates booked into the county jail, with 24 being from out of county and as many as 46 individuals that were booked in the month of August. The total minutes that those individuals were held in 2017 were 58,540, with 5,176 total meals served.

Compared to 2018, when there were 419 inmates booked into jail, with 27  from out of county and they were held for a total of 76,358 minutes. And with an increase in minutes that those individuals were held, the total number of meals went up to 6,398.

The current county jail has eight cells and Williams says they frequently send inmates to other county jail facilities. But he still has other issues he’s having to deal with. “We still have a lot of arrest warrants out there that if we find the people, yes, we’re going to arrest them and put them in jail, and I’ll have to find space for them. And then we have a lot of people waiting to serve sentences that we don’t have space for.”

Williams notes he currently has 91 arrest warrants to be served and 23 people waiting to serve jail sentences. Jail space has been an issue even before he was elected sheriff.

“Since being sheriff and even when Sheriff (Steve) Haupert was in office we were consistently full and it just progressively gets worse. And not saying it’s a bad thing, but (Greene County Attorney) Thomas Laehn is actually getting people sentenced to jail sentences, which is just adding to our problem as far as jail space.”

Williams adds he hasn’t seen a drop-off in the crime rate in Greene County yet, but he’s hoping that by working with other law enforcement agencies to arrest drug dealers in the county and working with the new county attorney, the crime rate will start to decrease.