Crow Wing County, Minnesota — The Jail, the Sheriff, the Judges

The Detention Center

Crow Wing County Jail

Operated byCrow Wing County Sheriff's Office
Address313 Laurel Street, Brainerd, MN 56401 (per county's own site)
Approved capacity276 beds, secure coed (per DOC inspection report)
Jail administrator named in DOC reportTroy Schilling
Public in-custody listReal-time custody roster at https://www3.crowwing.us/letg/Sheriff/Jail/custody2.html, dated 09/17/2026 in the copy viewed, listing approximately 90 individuals with booking numbers, charges (with MN statute citations) and custody status
Phone service vendor namedReliance Telephone (800-896-3201), for phone cards, texting devices and collect calls — no rate schedule found
What was triedThe main crowwing.us home page repeatedly failed with a robots.txt fetch timeout; the county's Board of Commissioners and budget pages were not located within the search budget.
Also sourced toCrow Wing County — In-Custody roster — https://www3.crowwing.us/letg/Sheriff/Jail/custody2.html
Also sourced toMN DOC — Crow Wing County Jail Inspection Report — https://mn.gov/doc/assets/Crow%20Wing%20County%202026_tcm1089-742794.pdf

Source: Crow Wing County — Contacting Inmates · checked 2026-09-18

Transparency rating

2/10Closed

✓The jail is named
✓Who is in custody
✗Beds and daily population — not published
✗What it costs taxpayers — not published
✗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 Crow Wing County publishes about a jail its taxpayers own, checked 2026-09-18. 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 builtNot found
Original costNot found
Paid for byNot found
Beds276 beds, secure coed, per MN DOC inspection report; not independently published on the pages of the county's own site that could be opened

Since then

Not found

The Sheriff

Sheriff Eric Klang

Runs the jailYes — elected sheriff has charge and custody of the county jail under Minn. Stat. 387.11 and 641.14 (MN state layer)
How the office is filledElected countywide to a four-year term under Minn. Stat. 382.01 (MN state layer)

Still needed

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

Source: MN DOC — Crow Wing County Jail Inspection Report, dated 04/01/2026 (issued 04/13/2026) · checked 2026-09-18

The Judges

Minnesota district judges are elected on a nonpartisan ballot to six-year terms, but most first reach the bench by gubernatorial appointment to a mid-term vacancy. Bail at first appearance is set by the court under Minn. R. Crim. P. 6.02.

Minnesota District Court (judicial district covering Crow Wing County)

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 2026-09-18

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

Notes on the record

'bond_info' scored 'no': the custody roster shows status labels such as 'BOND/BAIL SET' but the county's site offers no dedicated guidance page on how to post bail.
'fees' scored 'no': a third-party phone vendor (Reliance Telephone) is named for inmate phone cards, but no rate schedule was found on the county's own site.
Not found — a Board of Commissioners page was not located within the search/fetch budget

These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Crow Wing 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 2026-09-18 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered