The Detention Center
No jail operated by Stillwater County
- Operated byNot applicable
- Where prisoners go'Through a contract with the Yellowstone County Detention Facility (YCDF), Stillwater County prisoners are housed at the YCDF.' (quoted from the Sheriff's Office page, which directs visitors to YCDF's own site for prisoner detail)
- What was triedhttps://stillwatercountymt.gov/252/Sheriff and the county's department list (https://stillwatercountymt.gov/191/County-Departments-Staff-Other-Public-Of) — no jail or detention department exists
Source: Stillwater County MT — Sheriff · checked 2026-08-24
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year builtNot found
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- BedsNot found
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Charles E. Kem
- TitleSheriff/Coroner (Montana allows the Coroner office to be combined with the Sheriff, as it is here)
- TermExpires December 31, 2026
- Runs a jailNo — Stillwater County has no jail of its own
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Stillwater County MT — Sheriff · checked 2026-08-24
The Judges
Montana district court judges are elected officials of the state judicial district; Justices of the Peace are also elected and typically set bail at first appearance. Neither is a county administrative employee.
District Court Judge
- Not found
Justice Court
- Kaity Williams
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-08-24
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
- Stillwater County operates no jail of its own; its Sheriff's Office page states directly that prisoners are housed at the Yellowstone County Detention Facility (YCDF) under contract. This is recorded as the finding, per research brief, rather than treated as a gap.
- Because Stillwater holds no inmates of its own, none of the ten jail-transparency checks apply in the ordinary sense; all are recorded 'no' since no such content exists on the county's own site.
- Montana has no confirmed statutory adult jail inspection agency; state_inspection is recorded as empty for this reason, per research brief.
- Board of County Commissioners: Steve Riveland (District 1, term expires Dec 31, 2026), Jeff Ruffatto (Chair, District 2, term expires Dec 31, 2028), Roger Webb (District 3). Meets Mondays and Thursdays at 9:00 a.m.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Stillwater 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 2026-08-24 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered