The Detention Center
Yuma County Jail (Yuma County Sheriff's Office); prisoners are also housed at the Washington County Justice Center, Akron
- Operated byYuma County Sheriff's Office, with prisoners boarded at the Washington County Sheriff's Office facility
- Where prisoners goThe Sheriff's County Jail page states that visitors wishing to visit "an inmate housed at the Washington County Justice Center" should contact the Washington County Sheriff's Office, 26861 Highway 34, Akron, CO 80720, (970) 345-2244
- Own jail operationThe county's 2026 budget carries a separate Jail department (302) with staff salaries and overtime, Food & Meals Jail, Jail Kitchen Supplies, Prisoner Medical Services and Prisoner Prescriptions, so the county also runs jail operations of its own
- Boarding outThe Jail department budget includes a Boarding Prisoners expense line that has grown sharply across recent years, consistent with prisoners being held at Washington County
- Boarding inThe Jail department budget includes an Inmate Boarding revenue line and Federal SCAAP grant funds; recent Inmate Boarding revenue is shown as zero
- Jail phone listed970-332-0923
- Bond guidanceSheriff's County Jail page links a 'Legal Rights to Posting Money Bond' PDF
- VisitationCounty Jail page lists visitation days and times (male: Tuesdays and Saturdays 2:00–3:30 p.m.; female: Sundays and Wednesdays 2:00–3:30 p.m.), first come first served, government ID required. No rates published
- Shared servicesYuma County lists a Washington-Yuma County Combined Communications Center among its departments
- BedsNot found — no bed capacity or daily population published
- What was triedhttps://yumacountysheriff.net/projects/county-jail/ ; https://yumacountysheriff.net/meet-the-sheriff/ ; https://yumacountysheriff.net/ ; https://yumacounty.net/ ; https://yumacounty.net/departments/ ; https://yumacounty.net/contact/ ; https://yumacounty.net/commissioners/
Source: Yuma County Sheriff — County Jail · checked 2026-08-24
Transparency rating
3/10Closed- ✓The jail is named
- ✗Who is in custody — not published
- ✗Beds and daily population — not published
- ✓What it costs taxpayers
- ✗Deaths in custody — not published
- ✗PREA audits — not published
- ✗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
- BedsNot found
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Todd Combs
- Runs the jailYes — the Sheriff's Office publishes a County Jail page and the county budget carries a Jail department (302) under the Sheriff
- How the office is filledElected county sheriff; the Sheriff's Office says he won the November 2018 election and is a retired State Trooper with over 27 years' service
- Office address310 Ash Street, Suite G, Wray, CO 80758; office (970) 332-4805
- Confidence noteName taken from the Sheriff's Office 'Meet the Sheriff' page, which carries a 2019 page date. The office's own list of previous sheriffs ends with Chad Day (2011–2019), consistent with Combs as incumbent, and no successor is named anywhere on the county or sheriff site. Yuma County's own site does not name the sheriff.
Still needed
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Yuma County Sheriff — Meet the Sheriff · checked 2026-08-24
The Judges
Colorado judges are appointed through a judicial nominating commission and then face retention elections. District and county court judges are state judicial officers, not county officials. Yuma County shares the 13th Judicial District with Washington County and is served by the same district bench; the county budget notes that the 13th Judicial District Attorney's Office is funded jointly by the counties in the district.
13th Judicial District — District Court Chief Judge
- Carl S. McGuire III
13th Judicial District — District Court Judges
- Matthew W. E. Bradley
- Dina M. Christiansen
- Stevie M.G. Gagliano
- Robert C. James
- Kimbra L. Killin
Yuma County Court — County Court Judge
- Kristei R. Jones
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
- Where Yuma County's prisoners go is the central finding. The Sheriff's Office County Jail page directs visitors to the Washington County Justice Center in Akron, and the county's 2026 budget shows a Boarding Prisoners expense line in the Jail department that rises steeply across recent years. At the same time the Jail department (302) still carries its own staff, food, kitchen supplies and prisoner medical lines, so the county has not simply closed its jail. Neither the county nor the Sheriff's Office publishes a statement of which prisoners are held where, and the County Jail page carries a 2017 page date.
- Budget recorded as yes: the county publishes its full annual budget as a PDF on the commissioners page, and the 2026 budget contains a distinct Jail department (302) with revenue lines (Inmate Boarding, Federal SCAAP grant funds, OBH reimbursement) and expense lines (Boarding Prisoners, Food & Meals Jail, Jail Kitchen Supplies, Prisoner Medical Services, Prisoner Prescriptions, Transport/Assist Prisoners). Exact figures are not quoted here because the column alignment in the extracted PDF text could not be verified.
- No contract or per-diem rate for the boarding arrangement with Washington County is published on either county's site, so contracts is recorded as no.
- No inmate roster, bed capacity, daily population, PREA audit, inspection result or death-in-custody disclosure was found on the county or sheriff site.
- Colorado's state Jail Data Dashboard (https://ors.colorado.gov/ors-jaildata) publishes county jail population and in-custody death data under CRS 17-26-118, but that is the state publishing, not the county.
- The sheriff maintains a separate site at yumacountysheriff.net, linked from the county's own department list, and it is treated as the county's own publication.
- Three-member Board of County Commissioners: Adam Gates (District 1, 2025 Chairman), Scott Weaver (District 2), Mike Leerar (District 3). County Administrator Brandi Ritchey. Administrative office at the Yuma County Courthouse, 310 Ash, Suite A, Wray, CO 80758. Two regular meetings a month, one near the 15th and one on the last working day, starting at 8:00 a.m. The county posts budgets back to 2006, annual audits and BOCC minutes as PDFs on the commissioners page. No dedicated jail sales-tax levy was found.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Yuma 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