The Detention Center
Bulloch County Jail
- Operated byBulloch County Sheriff's Office
- Jail address17257 US-301 N, Statesboro, GA 30458
- Jail phone912.764.8888
- VisitationVideo visitation, scheduled at least 24 hours in advance
- Expansion (county budget)FY2027 budget lists a 'PFA Bond - Jail Addition' under debt
- Separate county facilityCounty budget also lists a Correctional Institute department (county-run, not the sheriff's jail)
- Jail AdministratorCapt. Kenny Thompson, Commander (Jail Operations)
Source: Bulloch County Sheriff's Office — Contact an Inmate · checked 2026-09-29
Transparency rating
2/10Closed- ✓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 — not published
- ✗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
- Jail addition financed by a PFA bond (listed in the county FY2027 budget; no size or cost read)
The Sheriff
Sheriff Noel Brown
- Runs the jailYes — the Sheriff's Office has a Jail Operations division providing 'care, custody and control of legally incarcerated inmates'
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Bulloch County Sheriff's Office · checked 2026-09-29
The Judges
Georgia's superior court judges are elected state judges who hear felony cases. For most charges a county magistrate sets bail soon after arrest; for the most serious felonies only a superior court judge can.
Who sets bail in Bulloch County
- Superior Court: the Ogeechee Judicial Circuit, which also serves Effingham, Jenkins and Screven. Superior court judges are elected circuit-wide in nonpartisan elections to four-year terms and hear felony cases; for the most serious felonies only a superior court judge can set bail.
- Magistrate Court: the Bulloch County Magistrate Court. For most charges a magistrate sets bail soon after arrest.
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-09-29
The Board of Commissioners
They pay for the jail. The sheriff runs it.
- What they controlThe county budget that funds the sheriff's office and the jail, and the jail building itself. Some small counties have a sole commissioner; consolidated governments such as Athens-Clarke, Augusta-Richmond, Columbus and Macon-Bibb have a commission instead.
- What they don'tDay-to-day operations. By law the sheriff is the jailer of the county and appoints the other jailers, subject to the governing authority's supervision (O.C.G.A. 42-4-1). No state agency inspects the jail.
- NoteMeets first and third Tuesday; agendas/minutes on CivicClerk.
- The boardBulloch County Board of Commissioners →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- Sheriff site confirmed Bulloch County, Georgia (Statesboro); names Sheriff Noel Brown and Jail Operations Commander Capt. Kenny Thompson.
- County site bullochcounty.net names Statesboro as the county seat and links budgets FY2016-FY2027.
- County budgets list a 'Sheriff - Jail Operations' department (FY2027, on OpenGov linked from the county Budget page) and Sheriff and Jail departments in the FY2022 PDF on the county's own domain; dollar amounts did not render to our reader.
- Sheriff site publishes phone, video-visit and commissary vendor names but no rates; no bond guidance, capacity, PREA, deaths or inspection material. /current-inmates/ returned 404.
- What was tried: bullochsheriff.com root first refused (provenance); 2 searches used (general search returned no own site; second limited to bullochsheriff.com). Command Staff page refused (provenance).
- State inspection/oversight: Georgia law makes the sheriff the county's jailer. The Georgia Sheriffs' Association, an association of the state's sheriffs rather than a state agency, publishes jail standards and a statewide monthly jail report.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Bulloch 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 is elected. So are the commissioners who pay for the jail, and the judges who set bail.
Names verified 2026-09-29 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered