Lake County, Michigan — The Jail, the Sheriff, the Judges

The Detention Center

Lake County Detention Center

Operated byLake County Sheriff's Office
Jail address1153 Michigan Avenue, Baldwin, MI 49304
Beds48 beds (expanded from an original 28-bed capacity following a 2000 remodel)
HistoryMain detention center opened in the mid-1960s; remodeled in 2000
StaffingJail Administrator, 4 Corporals, 10 Corrections Officers, per the county's own page
Jail AdministratorKeith Bartram (Corrections Administrator, per the Sheriff's Office Corrections page)

Source: Lake County, MI - Sheriff Office Corrections · checked 2026-09-19

Transparency rating

3/10Closed

✓The jail is named
✗Who is in custody — not published
✓Beds and daily population
✓What it costs taxpayers
✗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

This rates disclosure, not conduct — what Lake County publishes about a jail its taxpayers own, checked 2026-09-19. Nothing here says the jail is run well or badly. Every mark moves the moment the county posts the document.

The Building

You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.

Year builtMid-1960s
Original costNot found
Paid for byNot found
Beds48 (expanded from an original 28-bed capacity)

Since then

2000 remodel, expanding capacity from 28 to 48 beds

The Sheriff

Sheriff Richard Martin

Runs the jailThe Sheriff's Office operates the Lake County Detention Center, per the Sheriff's Office's own Corrections page
How the office is filledElected, four-year term; the county's own site states Sheriff Martin was elected in 2016 and is serving his third term
Statutory basisMCL 51.75 gives the elected county sheriff custody of the county jail

Still needed

Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail

Source: Lake County, MI - Sheriff and Under Sheriff · checked 2026-09-19

The Judges

Michigan circuit and district court judges are elected on a nonpartisan ballot to six-year terms under Mich. Const. art. VI — state judicial officers, not county officials.

Lake County Circuit Court

Not found

Still needed

The county's bond schedule
Share of the jail population held pretrial
Median time from booking to first appearance

Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-09-19

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 boardhttps://lakecountymi.gov/board-of-commissioners/ →
Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →

Notes on the record

The Sheriff's Office's own Corrections page gives detailed facility history (opened mid-1960s, remodeled in 2000) and current 48-bed capacity, and names the Corrections Administrator.
The county's FY2026 budget message (a document on the county's own site, lakecountymi.gov) itemizes jail operations spending: budgeted meal costs of $128,115 (based on 30 average daily inmates), $130,000 for jail overtime, and approximately $130,428 for inmate medical services, alongside Road Patrol Fund and Sheriff Administration figures; it does not give one consolidated 'Sheriff and Jail' total.
Site search on lakecountymi.gov for PREA and bond-related content returned no results; a corrections/inmate roster, contracts, and a public fee schedule were not found.
State inspection/oversight: Michigan county jails are subject to inspection under the Michigan Department of Corrections' Administrative Rules for Jails and Lockups; no county-published inspection reports were found on lakecountymi.gov.

These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Lake 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 2026-09-19 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered