The Detention Center
Towns County Detention Center
- Operated byTowns County Sheriff's Office
- Jail address4070 GA Hwy 339, Young Harris, GA 30582
- Jail phone(706) 896-5474
- VisitationBy appointment only
Source: Towns County Sheriff's Office — Jail · 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 — not published
- ✗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 Anthony Coleman
- Runs the jailYes — the sheriff's site runs the Towns County Detention Center (O.C.G.A. 42-4-1)
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term
- CurrentSheriff's own Employment page reads 'SHERIFF ANTHONY COLEMAN'; the Georgia Sheriffs' Association 2026 Directory lists an interim sheriff with no name
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Towns County Sheriff's Office — Employment · 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 Towns County
- Superior Court: the Enotah Judicial Circuit, which also serves Union, Lumpkin and White. 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 Towns 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.
- NoteCounty government site townscountyga.org could not be opened (certificate/robots error, PROVENANCE_REQUIRED); governing body not confirmed on a county page.
- The boardNot found
- Where the jail money is decidedNot found
Notes on the record
- Sheriff's site confirmed as Towns County, Georgia; Jail page names the Towns County Detention Center, Young Harris.
- The directory lists an interim sheriff with no name; the sheriff's own Employment page names Sheriff Anthony Coleman.
- Jail page explains four ways to post bond (approved bonding companies, money order, property bonds, out-of-county property bonds) with bonding and lien documents linked.
- Jail page covers commissary deposits (online/kiosk) and visitation by appointment; no fee rates, capacity, roster, PREA or inspection material found.
- County seat not recorded: the county government site could not be opened, and no sheriff page states the seat.
- What was tried: townscountysheriff.org home and Employment opened; Jail page first rate-limited (HTTP 429), then opened from a search result. townscountyga.org (commissioner2, sheriff, government pages) refused — certificate mismatch / robots / PROVENANCE_REQUIRED. County budget and minutes not examined.
- 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 Towns 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