The Detention Center
Greene County Jail (the Sheriff's Office also refers to the facility as the Greene County Justice Center)
- Operated byGreene County Sheriff's Office
- Bed capacity1,242 beds (Sheriff's Office detention page)
- Average daily population730 inmates (Sheriff's Office detention page)
- Supervision model'Modified Supervision'; about 180 community volunteers design and run inmate programs
- StaffingThe Sheriff's Office recruiting document reports 348 personnel with over 200 citizen volunteers agency-wide
- Jail addressNot found on the county's own pages that could be opened
- What was triedgreenecountymo.gov/sheriff/division/detention/ (refused, PROVENANCE_REQUIRED); greenecountymo.gov/sheriff/?page=civil-division-faqs (no bond or fee content); greenecountymo.gov/sheriff/mission.php (no facility detail)
Source: Greene County Sheriff - Greene County Justice Center / detention page · checked 2026-09-18
Transparency rating
3/10Closed- ✓The jail is named
- ✓Who is in custody
- ✓Beds and daily population
- ✗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
- Beds1,242 beds published by the Sheriff's Office; a 2017 Commission briefing describes a 20-year jail funding plan that would move planned capacity from 1,407 beds to 1,215 beds
Since then
- A Greene County Commission daily briefing of October 4, 2017 records commission approval of a proposed jail funding plan covering a 20-year period, with 'a starting number of beds and sustainable salary structure for employees', moving planned capacity from 1,407 beds to 1,215 beds and reducing 58 jail staff (https://greenecountymo.gov/files/files.php?id=32290)
The Sheriff
Sheriff Jason Johnson (Interim Sheriff)
- Runs the jailYes - RSMo 221.020 makes the sheriff the jailer; the Greene County Sheriff's Office operates the jail
- How the office is filledElected countywide; this officeholder was appointed interim by the County Commission
- StatusCounty press release dated 8/18/2026: 'Greene County Commission accepts Sheriff Arnott's resignation, appoints Captain Jason Johnson as Interim Sheriff'
- PredecessorJim Arnott, resigned 2026
- Sheriff's office address1010 North Boonville, Springfield 65802 (state law-enforcement contact dataset)
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Greene County Missouri - county home page press release · checked 2026-09-18
The Judges
Greene County is one of only six Missouri jurisdictions - with Clay, Jackson, Platte, St. Louis County and St. Louis City - where the 1940 Missouri Nonpartisan Court Plan reaches the trial bench: circuit and associate circuit judges are merit-selected from a commission panel, appointed by the governor, and then face yes/no retention elections rather than partisan ballots. Everywhere else in Missouri those judges run on a partisan ballot. Judges are state judicial officers, not county officials. No individual judge could be confirmed from a county or court page opened in this session, so none is named.
Circuit Court and Associate Circuit Court serving Greene County
- 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
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- Greene County is the largest jurisdiction in this group and publishes more about its jail than the other six counties combined: bed capacity and average daily population are both on the Sheriff's Office detention page, and the Sheriff's Office runs its own active jail population and booking photo lookup on the county domain.
- The county's financial dashboard (greenecountymo.gov/dashboard/) and transparency portal (greenecountymo.gov/transparency/) are both linked from the county home page, but every attempt to open them was refused with PROVENANCE_REQUIRED, so no corrections or detention budget figure could be read. 'budget' is therefore recorded as 'no'. That reflects what could be opened here, not a finding that the county withholds the figure.
- No PREA audit report, no in-custody death notice, no prisoner-housing contract with rates, no bond-posting guidance and no inmate phone or commissary rate schedule was found on any Greene County page that could be opened.
- No Missouri state agency inspects county jails. The Department of Corrections inspects state prisons under RSMo chapter 217; that authority does not reach chapter 221 county jails. The only statutory mechanisms are local and lay - a grand jury visit under RSMo 221.300, and a county board of visitors under RSMo 221.320-221.350, which RSMo 221.350 requires to report yearly to the county. The Greene County Commission briefing minutes index was opened and publishes minutes from 2018 through 2026, but it carries no board of visitors report, no grand jury jail report and no jail inspection document.
- Missouri has no death-in-custody reporting law and no public statewide dataset; RSMo 58.451(1)(5) requires only that the coroner be notified of a death from injury or illness in custody.
- Under the Sunshine Law, RSMo 610.023, a records request must be acted upon as soon as possible and no later than the end of the third business day after receipt.
- Greene County is governed by a three-member County Commission (a presiding commissioner and two associate commissioners). The Commission accepted the sheriff's resignation and appointed the interim sheriff in August 2026. Individual commissioner names could not be confirmed - the commission briefing page was refused (PROVENANCE_REQUIRED). The briefing minutes index was opened and publishes minutes from 2018 through 2026.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Greene 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