The Detention Center
Merrimack County Department of Corrections
- Operated byMerrimack County Department of Corrections
- Who runs itGarrett Jewell — Superintendent, Merrimack County Department of Corrections, appointed by the Board of County Commissioners (RSA 30-B:3)
- Jail address314 Daniel Webster Highway, Boscawen, NH 03303
- TypeDirect supervision correctional facility; lobby open 24/7
- Who is heldPre-arraignment, pre-trial and sentenced men and women, administrative transfers from other facilities, and federal inmates
- Assistant SuperintendentJessica Riendeau
- 2025 average daily population204 (county 2025 annual report)
- 2025 volumeAbout 1,880 people booked in; 1,831 releases; 942 initial classifications
- Bed countNot found — no capacity figure is published by the county
- Year built / costNot found — checked the corrections pages, the 2025 annual report and the Financial Documents page
Source: Merrimack County 2025 Annual Report (PDF) · checked 2026-08-23
Transparency rating
3/10Closed- ✓The jail is named
- ✗Who is in custody — not published
- ✗Beds and daily population — not published
- ✓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 — 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
- BedsNot found
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff David Croft
- Runs the jailNo — the Superintendent of the Merrimack County Department of Corrections does
- RoleCivil process, warrants, transports, dispatch and court security
- CommandMaj. Thomas DeAngelis; Capt. Keith Sawyer
- Listed as sheriff in the county's 2025 annual reportDavid Croft
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Merrimack County Sheriff — Contact Us / staff directory · checked 2026-08-23
The Judges
Judges in New Hampshire are state judicial officers, not county officials. They are nominated by the Governor and appointed with the consent of the Executive Council, and are never elected. New Hampshire has a unified state trial court: the Superior Court and the Circuit Court (district, family and probate divisions) are state courts. The county pays for and maintains courthouse space but does not choose the judges. The Judicial Branch publishes a clerk for each court location and does not publish a sitting-judge roster per county, so no presiding judge is named here. Appointment method source: https://www.courts.nh.gov/our-courts/superior-court
NH Circuit Court — 6th Circuit, District Division — Concord (32 Clinton Street, Concord)
- Not published per county — the Judicial Branch lists Circuit Clerk Theresa A. McCafferty and no judge
NH Circuit Court — 6th Circuit, District Division — Franklin (7 Hancock Terrace, Franklin) and Hooksett (101 Merrimack Street, Hooksett)
- Not published per county — Circuit Clerks Lisa Lamper (Franklin) and Melanie M. Oliver (Hooksett), no judge
Merrimack Superior Court (5 Court Street, Concord)
- Not published — the Judicial Branch page lists Clerk Jennifer L. Uhouse and no judge
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-08-23
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
- Superintendent: the county's own corrections contact page lists Superintendent Garrett Jewell and Assistant Superintendent Jessica Riendeau, and the 2025 annual report county directory also names Garrett Jewell as Corrections Superintendent. The previous superintendent, Travis Cushman, was placed on leave in March 2025 after a New Hampshire Fish and Game poaching case (NHPR, 1 April 2025); he is not the current superintendent and is not recorded as such here.
- Budget: the Financial Documents page publishes the 2026 Budget Resolution (https://www.merrimackcounty.net/HomePage/20260306%20Budget%20Resolution.pdf), which lists line 11-12 Corrections Department at $18,740,508, and the March 2026 delegation budget presentation (https://www.merrimackcounty.net/Departments/Finance/2026%20Budget%20Powerpoint-Mar%20Delegation.pdf). The 2025 annual report states a 2025 MCDOC budget of $17,199,999.
- Capacity: the county publishes an average daily population of 204 for 2025 in its annual report but publishes no bed count, so the capacity check is marked no. The figure 'Capacity = 290 beds' that appears in the county budget presentation refers to the Merrimack County Nursing Home, not the jail.
- PREA: the county posts a full PREA audit report for 2024, a 2021 Survey of Sexual Victimization form, its PREA policy and 2025 aggregated PREA data at https://www.merrimackcounty.net/departments/corrections/prison_rape_elimination_act_(prea).php
- Fees: the commissary page publishes weekly spending limits by classification ($95 minimum / $85 medium / $75 maximum) but no commissary prices, phone rates or video-visit rates; communication is routed to Securus Technologies and JailATM. Marked no.
- Contracts: the 2025 annual report notes 'Corrections: Higher federal census led to revenue $450,000 over budget', so the jail does hold federal prisoners, but no contract document and no per-diem rate is published.
- Roster and bail: no inmate roster and no guidance on how to post bail appears anywhere in the corrections section (checked Inmate Information, Mail, Visitation, Inmate Account/commissary, Community Corrections, Specialty Services, Contacts).
- New Hampshire has no state agency that inspects county jails and publishes the results the way the Maine Department of Corrections does. The only independent inspection of a New Hampshire county jail that is routinely published is the federal PREA audit, when the county chooses to post it.
- Three county commissioners elected by district under RSA 28 — District 1 Stephen Shurtleff (Bow, Concord), District 2 Stuart D. Trachy (Chair), District 3 David M. Lovlien Jr. (Vice-Chair). The commissioners supervise the Department of Corrections, but the county budget is voted by the Merrimack County Delegation — the county's state representatives — through its Executive Committee under RSA 24. Delegation officers in the 2025 annual report: Dave Luneau, Chair; Brian Seaworth, Vice Chair; Thomas Schamberg, Clerk; Executive Committee chaired by James MacKay. The 2026 budget resolution appropriates $18,740,508 to the Corrections Department against $3,705,000 of corrections revenue.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Merrimack 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.
In New Hampshire your town or city clerk runs the checklist and the polling place. Links from vote.gov and USA.gov.
Names verified 2026-08-23 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered