The Detention Center
Charles B. Webster Detention Center
- Operated byRichmond County Sheriff's Office
- Jail address1941 Phinizy Road, Augusta, GA 30906
- Rated capacityTotal bed capacity for 1,050 inmates
- Daily populationAverage daily inmate population of 1,165 (FY2024)
- CampusApproximately 50 acres within a maximum-security perimeter fence
- ExpansionPlans are underway for an expansion project that may include an additional 300 inmate beds
- StaffOver 200 employees in the Jail Division
- AccreditationSheriff's Office lists CALEA, ACA and NCCHC accreditation (Triple Crown); no audit reports posted
- Jail AdministratorMajor Chester Huffman Jr., Director of Detention Services (Command Staff page: https://www.richmondcountysheriffsoffice.com/staff.cfm)
Source: Richmond County Sheriff's Office — Jail Division · checked 2026-09-29
Transparency rating
6/10Partial- ✓The jail is named
- ✓Who is in custody
- ✓Beds and daily population
- ✓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
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year builtNot found
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds1,050 (total bed capacity, sheriff's Jail Division page)
Since then
- Planned expansion that may add 300 inmate beds (sheriff's Jail Division page)
The Sheriff
Sheriff Eugene "Gino Rock" Brantley
- Runs the jailYes — the Jail Division page says the Charles B. Webster Detention Center operates under the leadership of Sheriff Eugene 'Gino' Brantley
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term; elected June 2024, took office January 1, 2025 (sheriff's own page)
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Richmond County Sheriff's Office — Sheriff Brantley · 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 Richmond County
- Superior Court: the Augusta Judicial Circuit, which also serves Burke. 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 Richmond 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.
- NoteConsolidated Augusta-Richmond County government; the Augusta Commission (Mayor and Commission) is the governing body.
- The boardAugusta Commission →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- Sheriff's site opened and confirmed Georgia (Augusta); Jail Division, Visitation, Bonding Guidelines, Inmate Inquiry, Command Staff, Accreditation and Useful Links pages all opened.
- Jail page reports average daily population of 1,165 (FY2024) against a total bed capacity of 1,050.
- Inmate Inquiry page links the City of Augusta / Sheriff's Office online in-custody lookup (appweb2.augustaga.gov).
- Bonding Guidelines explain professional, property and cash bonds, list four approved bonding companies, and state a $20.00 Sheriff's Bonding Fee on property or cash bonds.
- Visitation page publishes the inmate phone rate: $0.16/minute plus tax ($2.40 + tax for 15 minutes), provider Combined Public Communications; video visitation via InmateSales.com.
- Augusta FY2026 Proposed Budget shows Fund 273 Law Enforcement at $89,948,160 and notes a $1.47 million net increase in prisoner costs at the Charles B. Webster Detention Center.
- Accreditation page lists CALEA, ACA and NCCHC accreditation but posts no audit or inspection reports.
- No PREA, deaths-in-custody, inspection report or vendor-contract material found on the sheriff's pages opened.
- The county budget also references RCCI (Richmond County Correctional Institution), a separate county facility; not researched further.
- 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 Richmond 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