The Detention Center
Will County Adult Detention Facility
- Operated byWill County Sheriff's Office
- ADF contact address (sheriff site)16911 W. Laraway Rd, Suite 101, Joliet, IL 60433
- Facility address (IDOC 2025 and county news release)95 S. Chicago Street, Joliet
- Opened (sheriff site)March 1989
- Capacity (sheriff site)Over 1,000 inmates, up from original 322
- Expansion$70 million expansion, May 2009: 156,000 to 318,000 sq ft, 10 housing units added
- Rated capacity (IDOC 2025)909
- Population on inspection day (IDOC 2025)488
- Jail administrator (IDOC 2025)David Adams
- Accreditation (sheriff site)American Correctional Association / National Commission on Accreditation for Corrections
- Phone vendorSmart Communications
- Commissary depositsStellar Services LLC via Jail ATM
Source: Will County Sheriff — Adult Detention Facility page · checked 2026-09-20
Transparency rating
5/10Partial- ✓The jail is named
- ✓Who is in custody
- ✓Beds and daily population
- ✗What it costs taxpayers — not published
- ✗Deaths in custody — not published
- ✓PREA audits
- ✗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 builtOpened March 1989 (sheriff site); IDOC 2025 report gives 8 Dec 1990
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- BedsOver 1,000 (sheriff site); IDOC 2025 rated capacity 909
Since then
- $70 million expansion, May 2009 (sheriff site)
The Sheriff
Sheriff Mike Kelley
- Runs the jailYes — the sheriff is warden of the county jail (55 ILCS 5/3-15003)
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term
- Name noteThe IDOC 2025 report spells it 'Michael Kelly'; the sheriff's own site says 'Mike Kelley'
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Will County Sheriff's Office site · 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.
Will 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).
- NoteWill County Board, 23 members, 302 N. Chicago Street, Joliet. Agendas via the OneMeeting Agenda Portal.
- The boardWill County Board →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- Sheriff's site links its own inmate search at inquiry.willcosheriff.org; the search itself could not be opened (robots.txt), but it is the sheriff's own subdomain.
- PREA page gives policy, reporting routes, audits (2014, 2017 final) and coordinator reports (2013-2016, 2022).
- Bail/commissary page: bail is paid at the ADF booking area, not online; no fee rates published.
- County Budget & Finance page opened but no budget document or sheriff/jail line found in its content; budget marked no.
- Sheriff's site says the ADF holds people awaiting trial or serving sentences up to one year; no contracts, deaths or inspection reports found.
- State inspection/oversight: IDOC Jail and Detention Standards Unit, inspected 30 Jul 2025: rated capacity 909, population 488 that day; noncompliances: 701.130 supervisory checks 'at least once every 30 minutes' in indirect supervision housing — on time 98.3% of the time.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Will 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