The Detention Center
Washington County Detention Center
- Operated byWashington County Sheriff's Office
- Address262 East Court St., Weiser, ID 83672
- Phone208-414-2124
- Rated capacity49
- Average daily population39
- Jail administratorJohnny Biddinger, per the Idaho Sheriffs' Association jail directory
- What was triedhttps://www.co.washington.id.us/255/County-Jail, /227/Sheriff, /151/County-Officials and /directory.aspx?did=13 were all attempted; the sheriff and jail pages returned partial content with no links, and repeated attempts returned robots.txt blocks. No county page could be cited for jail detail.
Source: Idaho Sheriffs' Association — Directory of Idaho's Jails · checked 2026-08-24
Transparency rating
0/10Closed- ✗The jail is named — not published
- ✗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 — 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
- BedsRated capacity 49 per the Idaho Sheriffs' Association jail directory; not published on the county's own site
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Matt Thomas
- Runs the jailYes — the Washington County Detention Center
- How the office is filledElected (Idaho Code Title 20 Chapter 6 places the county jail under the sheriff)
- ConfidenceNamed in the Idaho Sheriffs' Association jail directory with a co.washington.id.us email address. The county's own site could not be opened to confirm — every co.washington.id.us page returned a robots.txt block — so this name is not confirmed against the county
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Idaho Sheriffs' Association — Directory of Idaho's Jails · checked 2026-08-24
The Judges
Idaho District Court judges are elected and face retention; magistrate judges are appointed by a district magistrates commission and then stand for retention election. They are state judicial officers, not county officials. No judicial district number or judge name could be sourced for Washington County because the county's own site could not be opened.
District Court — judicial district serving Washington County
- Not found
Magistrate Court — Washington County
- Not found
- 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 →
Notes on the record
- Idaho Sheriffs' Association jail inspections are voluntary, not statutory, and the reports are not public, so state_inspection is recorded as blank. Idaho also has no statute requiring a jail death to be reported to anyone.
- Every transparency check is recorded as no because no page on the county's own domain, co.washington.id.us, could be opened and read. The county does have a page titled 'WASHINGTON County Jail' at https://www.co.washington.id.us/255/County-Jail, but it could not be retrieved, so it is not cited as a pass.
- The Idaho Sheriffs' Association directory lists the sheriff's office website as law.co.washington.id.us/sheriff/; that address could not be fetched either.
- This county has a jail. Washington County is not one of the Idaho counties that contracts its prisoners out.
- Idaho counties are governed by a three-member Board of County Commissioners. Commissioner names could not be sourced — https://www.co.washington.id.us/151/County-Officials was attempted and returned no names or links.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Washington 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