The Detention Center
Not scored. The parish's and sheriff's own websites could not be reached or read in the session that produced this record, so their disclosures were never examined. This is a gap in the research, not a finding about the parish.
- Operated byVernon Parish Sheriff's Office
- WardenBrad Conn, Parish Prison Warden (Louisiana Sheriffs' Association directory; sheriff's staff)
- Facility nameNot published on any first-party page that could be opened; the name is not recorded from commercial lookup sites
- What was triedOne search returned only commercial inmate-lookup sites and the Louisiana Sheriffs' Association directory (opened). The directory lists the sheriff's web presence as a Facebook page and an email at vpso.org. Refused (PROVENANCE_REQUIRED): www.vpso.org. No parish-government page was reached.
Source: Louisiana Sheriffs' Association - Vernon Parish directory · checked 2026-09-18
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 John S. "Sam" Craft
- Runs the jailThe sheriff is keeper of the parish jail under La. R.S. 15:704; the Louisiana Sheriffs' Association directory lists a Parish Prison Warden under him
- How the office is filledElected parish sheriff
- Source caveatName taken from the Louisiana Sheriffs' Association directory entry for Vernon Parish, Louisiana; no sheriff or parish page could be opened to confirm it
- Office1203 South Fourth Street, Leesville, LA 71446; 337-238-1311
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Louisiana Sheriffs' Association - Vernon Parish directory · checked 2026-09-18
The Judges
Louisiana district judges are elected in partisan elections to six-year terms. They are state judicial officers, not parish officials. Who sets bail at first appearance varies by parish - a district judge on rotation, a magistrate or commissioner, or in some parishes a justice of the peace - and Louisiana's bail statutes do not require that first appearance to happen in open court.
- The parish's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-09-18
The Parish Governing Authority
They maintain the jail building. The sheriff runs it.
- What they controlThe physical maintenance of the parish jail and the jail physician (La. R.S. 15:702, 15:703).
- What they don'tCustody of the jail. Under La. R.S. 15:704 the elected sheriff is “the keeper of the public jail of his parish.”
- The governing bodyNo governing-body page was found on the parish's own site
Notes on the record
- Louisiana has no general parish-jail inspection law. The Department of Public Safety and Corrections monitors compliance with its Basic Jail Guidelines at least annually, but only for jails that house state inmates for the state per diem; no public repository of those compliance reports was located.
- The transparency checks are left empty: neither the Vernon Parish Sheriff's Office's own site nor the parish government's site could be opened, so nothing the parish or sheriff publishes was examined. This is not a finding that the parish publishes nothing.
- The Louisiana Sheriffs' Association directory is not a first-party source; the sheriff and warden names recorded here rest on it alone.
- Not found. No Vernon Parish government page could be opened, so the form of government and the members' names are not recorded here.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Vernon Parish 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 is the parish governing body that pays for it.
Names verified 2026-09-18 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered