The Detention Center
Not scored. The county's own website was not reachable in the session that produced this record, so its disclosures were never examined. This is a gap in the research, not a finding about the county.
- Operated byMadison County Sheriff's Office
- JailA roster headed 'Madison County Sheriffs Office', linking to mcso.ar.gov and listing people from Huntsville, Arkansas, is published on the vendor platform myr2m.com
- Capacity (secondary)24, male and female, per the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association directory - not a county publication
- Jail administrator (staff)Lola Mitchell, per the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association directory; answers to the sheriff
- Jail phone (secondary)(479) 738-5624, per the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association directory
- What was triedSheriff's own site mcso.ar.gov returned 'Site is unavailable'; the county's quorum court page madisoncogov.com/quorum_court.php returned 404. Neither was retried. Commercial inmate-lookup sites (arkansasprisons.org, madisoncountydetentionar.org, arkansassheriffsassociation.com, arkansasinmates.org) and Madison County, Alabama results were not used
- Arkansas Sheriffs' Association directoryHolds: Male & Female; capacity 24; jail phone (479) 738-5624; jail administrator Lola Mitchell. Checked 18 September 2026; an association directory, not a county source - https://arsheriffs.org/sheriffs/madison-county-sheriff/
Source: Madison County Sheriffs Office - roster (myr2m.com) · checked 2026-09-18
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year builtNot found
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- BedsNot found
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Ryan Ray
- Runs the jailYes - the elected sheriff is the jailer under state law; the sheriff's office publishes an in-custody roster through its roster vendor
- How the office is filledElected county sheriff, four-year term (Ark. Const. art. 7, § 46; Amendment 95)
- Statutory basisA.C.A. § 12-41-502 gives the county sheriff the custody, rule and charge of the jail and all prisoners committed in the county
- Office address201 West Main St., Huntsville, AR 72740 (per the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association directory)
- Source caveatName taken from the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association directory; the sheriff's own site mcso.ar.gov returned 'Site is unavailable'
- Arkansas Sheriffs' Association directoryLists Ryan Ray; office 201 West Main St., Huntsville, AR 72740, phone (479) 738-2320. Checked 18 September 2026; an association directory, not a county source - https://arsheriffs.org/sheriffs/madison-county-sheriff/
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Arkansas Sheriffs' Association - Madison County Sheriff · checked 2026-09-18
The Judges
Arkansas circuit judges are elected on a nonpartisan ballot to six-year terms; the governor fills a mid-term vacancy by appointment until the next general election. They are state judicial officers, not county officials. Under Ark. R. Crim. P. 8.1 an arrested person goes before a judicial officer without unnecessary delay; depending on the court, that may be a circuit judge or a magistrate. Arkansas's "county judge" is the county's chief executive, not a judicial officer, and does not set bail. No court or county page naming the circuit number or a judge could be opened for this county.
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-09-18
The County Judge and Quorum Court
They pay for the jail. The sheriff runs it.
- County judgeLarry Garrett — the county’s chief executive, not a judicial officer; named in the Association of Arkansas Counties directory, checked 2026-09-18
- What they controlThe county judge and quorum court fund and build the jail: the detention budget, the building itself, and any dedicated jail sales tax.
- What they don'tCustody of the jail. Under A.C.A. § 12-41-502 the elected sheriff has “the custody, rule, and charge” of the jail and its prisoners.
- The quorum courtNo quorum court page was found on the county's own site
Notes on the record
- Checks left empty: the sheriff's own site (mcso.ar.gov) reported 'Site is unavailable' and the county's quorum court page (madisoncogov.com) returned 404, so no first-party page was examined. This county is unexamined, not scored as closed.
- Arkansas confirmed: the sheriff's site banner reads 'Proudly serving and protecting the citizens of Madison County, Arkansas', and the vendor roster lists Huntsville, Arkansas addresses. Madison County, Missouri and Madison County, Alabama results were set aside.
- The Arkansas Sheriffs' Association directory lists a 24-bed capacity and names the jail administrator; that is a secondary source and is not counted toward any check.
- Search results included several commercial inmate-lookup sites; none is cited or counted.
- Arkansas law requires each county jail to be inspected at least annually by a governor-appointed district criminal detention facility review committee (A.C.A. § 12-26-107), against mandatory state minimum standards. The written report goes to the district's administrative judge and to the county judge; state law does not require it to be published, and no public state repository of the reports was located.
- A.C.A. § 12-12-315 requires notice of a death in jail custody to the county coroner, the prosecuting attorney and the sheriff; it is a notification duty to officials, not a public-reporting law, and no public Arkansas list or dataset of jail deaths was located.
- Arkansas form: an elected County Judge (the chief executive, not a judicial officer) and a Quorum Court (the legislative body), which hold funding and construction authority for the jail. The county's quorum court page on madisoncogov.com appeared in search but returned 404, so no County Judge or justice of the peace is named.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Madison County and what it costs the people who live here. Nationally, almost 77% of the people who died in local jails in 2019 had not been convicted of anything, and suicide was the leading single cause of those deaths (Bureau of Justice Statistics, Mortality in Local Jails, 2000–2019).
How much is your sheriff — and your judge — costing you?
Your VOTE is POWERFUL.
The sheriff who runs this jail is elected. So are the justices of the peace on the quorum court who pay for it.
Names verified 2026-09-18 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered