With many Indiana jails at or near capacity, it has become difficult at times for small county jails to secure overflow housing.
In Wabash County, which has transferred some of its inmates to Miami County since 2010 to avoid overcrowding, the Elkhart and Wells county jails are now needed to provide overflow space even as the Wabash County Jail has been rated over capacity every day for more than a year.
Those three facilities may no longer be enough.
On Monday, Wabash County Sheriff Bob Land advised the Wabash County Board of Commissioners that available beds at the Miami County Jail have been in short supply recently while the number of bookings in Wabash have increased over the last three weeks.
In turn, as of Monday morning the Wabash County Jail was holding 98 inmates, which is 26 inmates over the jail’s rate of capacity of 72.
Overflow beds are installed in cells at the Wabash County Jail while it is over capacity, but a high number of inmates often affects objective classification of offenders, according to the Wabash County Jail report for 2016.
“More and more counties are asking us to house their inmates,” Miami County Sheriff Timothy Miller said on Monday. “It is filling us up quickly.”
While some space was available, Miller estimates that between 60-70 percent of inmates at the Miami County Jail are sent from other counties, including Wabash, Carroll, Cass and Howard counties.
The increasing number of female inmates booked throughout Indiana has compounded overcrowding due to special accommodations that are needed to separate men and women.
Copyright © 2024 Wabash Plain Dealer