The Detention Center
Sibley County Jail
- Operated bySibley County Sheriff's Office
- Licensed capacity19 beds (approved capacity), per 09/25/2025 DOC inspection report
- Jail administrator named in DOC reportAaron Louwagie
- What was triedco.sibley.mn.us and www.co.sibley.mn.us repeatedly returned an unresolvable http/https redirect loop across multiple fetch attempts and could not be opened this session; the sheriff's own subdomain (sheriff.co.sibley.mn.us) was reachable and served only a jail custody roster, no further navigation or facility details
Source: MN DOC — Sibley County Jail Inspection Report, 09/25/2025 · checked 2026-09-18
Transparency rating
1/10Closed- ✗The jail is named — not published
- ✓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
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year builtNot found
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds19 (approved capacity, per 09/25/2025 DOC report)
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Patrick Nienaber
- Runs the jailYes — elected sheriff is jailer under Minn. Stat. 387.11 and 641.14
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term (Minn. Stat. 382.01)
- Source of nameMN DOC facility inspection report dated 09/25/2025; Sibley County's own site could not be confirmed (see notes)
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: MN DOC — Sibley County Jail Inspection Report, 09/25/2025 · 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.
District Court — First Judicial District
- 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 2026-09-18
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
- Sibley County's main website (co.sibley.mn.us / www.co.sibley.mn.us) could not be opened this session: WebFetch repeatedly reported an http<->https redirect loop across several attempts and paths. The sheriff's own subdomain (sheriff.co.sibley.mn.us) was reachable and displays a live custody roster (dated 01-25-2025 in the copy fetched), which is credited as the 'roster' check. No other page on the county's own domain could be examined, so the remaining nine checks are recorded 'no' rather than left blank, but should be read as 'not verifiable this session' rather than a confirmed absence — except roster, which was directly observed.
- Sibley County Board of Commissioners; the county's main site could not be opened this session (redirect loop), so no direct board/agenda URL was confirmed.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Sibley 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