The Detention Center
Oakland County Jail (Main Jail and Annex; East Annex satellite currently closed)
- Operated byOakland County Sheriff's Office, Corrective Services Division
- Jail address1200 North Telegraph Road, Bldg 38E, Pontiac, MI 48341-1044
- Beds/capacityMain Jail approximately 440 inmates (2nd floor) plus 109 intake capacity; Annex approximately 487 inmates; East Annex approximately 398 inmates (currently closed) — combined operational capacity on the order of 1,000+ beds, per the county's own Jail page
- Year builtMain facility constructed in 1973; Annex completed March 1989; East Annex built 2003, per the county's own Jail page
- Population servedApproximately 1,664 inmates across various security levels, per the county's own Corrections group page
Source: Oakland County, MI - Oakland County Jail · checked 2026-09-19
Transparency rating
6/10Partial- ✓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
- ✗Independent inspection — not published
- ✗Who else it holds, and for how much — not published
- ✓How to post bond
- ✓Phone, video and commissary rates
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year built1973 (Main facility); Annex completed March 1989; East Annex built 2003 (currently closed), per the county's own Jail page
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- BedsApproximately 1,000+ combined (Main ~440 + 109 intake, Annex ~487, East Annex ~398 currently closed), per the county's own Jail page
Since then
- Annex completed March 1989
- East Annex built 2003 (currently closed)
The Sheriff
Sheriff Michael J. Bouchard
- Runs the jailThe Sheriff's Office operates the Oakland County Jail (main facility and Annex) under its Corrective Services Division, per the county's own site
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term, MCL 51.70; Bouchard was initially appointed in January 1999 and has since been elected to seven terms, most recently in 2024 (term January 1, 2025 - January 1, 2029), per the county's own biography page
- Statutory basisMCL 51.75 gives the elected county sheriff custody of the county jail
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Oakland County, MI - Sheriff Michael Bouchard · 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.
Oakland 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 2026-09-19
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://www.oaklandcountymi.gov/government/board-of-commissioners →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- Oakland is one of Michigan's largest counties; two searches and numerous page fetches on oaklandcountymi.gov were used to confirm the sheriff and jail details.
- The county's own Inmate Locator link points to a separate consortium system (apps.clemis.org/ClemisInmLoc), not on the oaklandcountymi.gov domain, so the roster check is scored 'no' per the audit rule.
- The county's own Jail page describes a zero-tolerance PREA policy with phone, email, and in-person reporting options.
- The county's own Inmate Information page describes bond posting (cash, credit card, cashier's check, or bail bondsman; no cryptocurrency accepted) and payment of court-ordered fines and costs at the jail; a per-diem housing/pay-to-stay fee schedule specific to the jail was not found.
- The county publishes a full adopted budget book (FY26-28) on its own CDN subdomain that would include sheriff/corrections appropriations, though a corrections-specific budget breakout was not isolated from the page opened.
- No inmate deaths-in-custody data, jail inspection reports, or named food/medical service contracts were found published on the county's own site in the pages opened.
- 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 oaklandcountymi.gov.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Oakland 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