The Detention Center
None — Stanton County's own site states it does not operate a jail
- Operated byStanton County Sheriff's Department holds custody authority; physical detention occurs in another county's facility, which the site does not name
- Where prisoners go"Arrestees who remain in custody after arraignment are remanded to the custody of the Stanton County Sheriff's Department. Arrestees are held in neighboring counties if they are unable to post bond." The page does not name the specific receiving county
- BailBail can be posted at the Stanton County Sheriff's Department 24 hours a day via cash or surety bond
- What was tried, to find the receiving county's nameChecked the Board of Commissioners' agendas/minutes page (https://www.stantoncountyks.com/meetings), which at the time fetched listed only future 2026 meeting dates with no posted minutes naming a jail-services contract or a receiving county
- Staff directory checkThe county's own staff directory (https://www.stantoncountyks.com/directory) lists no jail administrator, corrections officer, or detention officer position, consistent with Stanton County running no jail of its own
Source: Stanton County Sheriff's Department — Frequently Asked Questions · checked 2026-09-17
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 Clayton Kester
- TitleStanton County Sheriff
- Office address208 N Chestnut St / PO Box 520, Johnson, KS 67855 (per county staff directory); Sheriff's Department listed at 201 North Main Street, Johnson City, KS 67855, (620) 492-2140 (per county's own site)
- Phone620-492-6866
- Fax620-492-2585
- Statutory jail dutyK.S.A. 19-811 makes the elected sheriff the charge and custody officer of the county jail and all prisoners in it
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Kansas Sheriffs' Association — Stanton County profile · checked 2026-09-17
The Judges
Kansas decides judicial selection district by district under Kan. Const. Art. 3 §6 and K.S.A. 20-2901. In most rural Kansas counties the district magistrate judge sets bail (K.S.A. 20-302b). The 26th Judicial District elects its district judges on a partisan ballot - the default under Kan. Const. Art. 3 sec. 6. Its voters have not adopted the nonpartisan nominating-commission method available under K.S.A. 20-2901.
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-09-17
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 →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- The finding here is that Stanton County has no jail of its own, per its own site — not a gap. The specific receiving county under K.S.A. 19-1929 / 19-1916 could not be confirmed from any page on the county's own domain reachable this session.
- Kansas repealed its only county-jail inspection statutes — K.S.A. 75-5228, effective April 11, 1996, and its companion K.S.A. 75-5227, effective July 1, 1996 — and nothing has replaced them; the Kansas Department of Corrections runs no county-jail inspection program.
- Board of County Commissioners: Chris Floyd, Lonnie Brown, Nick Chenoweth (Chairman) (per the county's own staff directory).
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Stanton 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 2026-09-17 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered