The Detention Center
No county jail
- Operated byNot applicable
- County jailNone — the Illinois Sheriffs' Association lists 'No Jail' for Scott County, and no 2025 or 2024 IDOC inspection report exists at the standard URL
- Where prisoners goNot found on any page opened
Source: Illinois Sheriffs' Association — Scott County · checked 2026-09-20
Transparency rating
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year builtNot applicable — no county jail
- Original costNot applicable
- Paid for byNot applicable
- BedsNone
Since then
- Not applicable
The Sheriff
Sheriff Tom Eddinger
- Name sourceIllinois Sheriffs' Association directory only — the county's sheriff page did not print a name; not confirmed on a county page
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term
- Office address (ISA)101 E. Market Street, Winchester, IL 62694
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Illinois Sheriffs' Association — Scott County · checked 2026-09-20
The Judges
Illinois circuit judges are elected on a partisan ballot and then stand for retention every six years (60% yes needed); associate judges are appointed by the circuit judges. They are state judicial officers, not county officials. Since 18 September 2023 Illinois has no cash bail — judges decide pretrial release or detention at a hearing.
Scott County Circuit Court
- 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 2026-09-20
The County Board
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 is the warden of the jail by state law (55 ILCS 5/3-15003).
- NoteCounty site refers to a County Board and 'County Board Meeting Minutes', but the minutes list loads by script and could not be read.
- The boardScott County Board
- Where the jail money is decidedNot found
Notes on the record
- Scott County appears to have no jail of its own: no IDOC 2025 or 2024 inspection report exists at the standard URL (both returned 404), and the Illinois Sheriffs' Association lists 'No Jail'.
- Where Scott County's prisoners are held was not found. (Nearby Morgan County's IDOC 2025 report says only that it 'houses detainees for other counties', without naming them.)
- County site scottcoil.gov was opened (home, sheriff and financial-reports pages) but the sheriff and financial pages load their content by script and showed nothing substantive; checks left blank rather than scored.
- Rock Island County's FY2026 budget has a 'Scott County prisoner room & board' revenue line; that most likely refers to Scott County, Iowa, not this county (not confirmed).
- State inspection/oversight: No 2025 (or 2024) IDOC Jail and Detention Standards Unit report found for Scott County — consistent with the county having no jail.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Scott 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 county board members who pay for it.
Names verified 2026-09-20 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered