The Detention Center
Lincoln County Jail
- Operated byLincoln County Sheriff's Office
- Jail address103 3rd Avenue, P.O. Box 10, Hugo, CO 80821
- Phone(719) 743-2846; jail administrator line (719) 743-2426
- Beds40-bed facility housing pre-trial and sentenced inmates — 'The Lincoln County Jail is a 40 bed facility'
- Average daily population17.22 in 2022, with 270 bookings (213 male, 57 female) and an average length of stay of 13.8 days, per the office's own PREA annual report
- Intake practiceNewly admitted inmates are searched, fingerprinted, photographed and housed separately for up to 24 hours or until clearances are made
- Medical careContracted to Southern Health Partners (SHP); the office says the contract improved care and cut inmate transportation costs
- 2026 jail budget$1,945,520 for Sheriff — Jail, alongside $1,584,818 for Sheriff — Operations, in the county's final 2026 budget
- Bond fees published$10 bonding fee per bond plus municipal and county bond fees; $30 booking fee per processing; unpaid balances referred to outside vendor AdventFS/paymyjailer
- Bond rights published'Bond fees, booking fees, and other fees or debts never need to be paid to secure a person's release on money bond'; release required within six hours after bond is set for a defendant physically present
- VisitationSaturdays 08:00-17:00; visitors must be 18+ or accompanied by an adult
- VendorsSecurus for inmate phone calls, e-messaging and Video Connect; Inmate Canteen for commissary and care packages — no rates published
- What was triedhttp://lincolnsheriff.net/jail.html ; http://lincolnsheriff.net/bonds.html ; http://lincolnsheriff.net/admin.html ; https://lincolncounty.colorado.gov/county-commissioners ; https://lincolncounty.colorado.gov/administrator — no in-custody roster, death report or independent inspection found
Source: Lincoln County Sheriff's Office — Jail · checked 2026-08-24
Transparency rating
5/10Partial- ✓The jail is named
- ✗Who is in custody — not published
- ✓Beds and daily population
- ✓What it costs taxpayers
- ✗Deaths in custody — not published
- ✓PREA audits
- ✗Independent inspection — not published
- ✗Who else it holds, and for how much — not published
- ✓How to post bond
- ✗Phone, video and commissary rates — not published
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year builtNot found
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds40
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Tom Nestor
- Runs the jailYes — the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office operates the Lincoln County Jail
- How the office is filledElected county sheriff — listed as an elected official in the county department directory
- UndersheriffGordon D. Nall
- Command staffCaptain Michael L. Yowell; Sergeants Dustin Cunningham, Ryan Erwin, Cole Britton, Dale Rostron and Jesus Ortiz
- Address103 3rd Avenue, P.O. Box 10, Hugo, CO 80821
Still needed
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Lincoln County Sheriff's Office — Administration · checked 2026-08-24
The Judges
Colorado judges are appointed through a judicial nominating commission and then face retention elections. They are state judicial officers, not county officials. County court judges normally set bail at first appearance.
23rd Judicial District — District Court Chief Judge
- Ryan J. Stuart
23rd Judicial District — District Court Judge
- Shelby Fyles
Lincoln County Court — County Court Judge
- Miles Cabral
Still needed
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-08-24
The County Commissioners
They pay for the jail. The sheriff runs it.
- What they controlThe detention budget, the building itself, and the agreements that let other agencies rent its beds.
- What they don'tDay-to-day operations. The sheriff is separately elected and answers to voters, not to the board.
- The boardBoard of County Commissioners →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- Lincoln County is a small county that publishes more jail detail than most: a stated 40-bed capacity, a discrete Sheriff — Jail budget line of $1,945,520 for 2026, and a PREA annual report.
- The PREA annual report covering calendar year 2022 reports average daily population 17.22, 270 bookings, average length of stay 13.8 days, and zero PREA reports, with inmate-on-inmate and staff-on-inmate allegation tables all showing zero. It is the agency's own report, not an independent audit, so the separate inspections check remains no.
- The county does not host an in-custody roster; the jail page directs the public to VineLink, a third-party service, which does not count as county publishing.
- Bond and booking fees are published ($10 bonding fee, $30 booking fee), and the office publishes the CRS bond-rights language that those fees never need to be paid to secure release. Phone, video-visit and commissary vendors are named (Securus, Inmate Canteen) but no rates are published, so the fees check is no.
- The sheriff's office site is on its own domain, lincolnsheriff.net, which is linked as the official Sheriff entry from the county's department directory at https://lincolncounty.colorado.gov/department-directory.
- Lincoln County reports jail population and inmate deaths to the state under CRS 17-26-118 (HB19-1297), published on the state Jail Data Dashboard at https://ors.colorado.gov/ors-jaildata. That is state publishing, not county publishing.
- Board of County Commissioners — three members by district: Wayne Ewing (District 1, Chairman), Terry Jaques (District 2), Robert Safranek (District 3, Vice Chairman). Jacob Piper is County Administrator and the administrator's office handles the county budget. Minutes are posted by year and month on the commissioners page and agendas are posted as news articles. No dedicated detention sales-tax levy was found published.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Lincoln 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 commissioners who pay for it.
Names verified 2026-08-24 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered