The Detention Center
Grant County Detention Center
- Operated byGrant County (Corrections Department)
- Detention administrationJoseph Andazola — Detention Administrator (also serves as the facility's PREA Coordinator)
- Reporting lineNot established. The county's own site could not be opened to confirm whether detention sits under the Sheriff's Office or is a separate county department.
- Jail address320 South Ridge Road, Silver City, NM 88061
- Phone(575) 534-3803
- Prisoner in Custody listCounty corrections page links to a live 'Prisoner in Custody' list
- VisitationOne 30-minute visit per week; Saturday male unit, Sunday female/booking/infirmary, 8 am-3:30 pm
- BedsNot found on the county site
- What was triedhttps://grantcountynm.gov/166/Corrections ; /168/Prison-Rape-Elimination-Act-PREA ; /173/Visitation ; /167/Mail ; /183/Budget-Quarterly-Reports
Source: Grant County Corrections · checked 2026-08-24
Transparency rating
3/10Closed- ✓The jail is named
- ✓Who is in custody
- ✗Beds and daily population — not published
- ✓What it costs taxpayers
- ✗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 byOperating funding shown in the county's own Fiscal Year 2020-2021 Final Budget, fund 22600 'Jail - Detention': revenues $733,500 (including $589,000 County Correctional Gross Receipts Tax, $85,000 'Care of Prisoners' charges for services, $50,000 County Detention Distribution from the NM Department of Finance and Administration) plus $2,969,320 in other financing sources; detention centre expenditures (department 8002) $3,702,820.
- BedsNot found
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Raul Villanueva
- Runs the jailNo — Corrections is a separate Grant County department headed by a Detention Administrator; the Sheriff's Office is a separate elected office
- How the office is filledElected county sheriff
- Sheriff's office1400 Highway 180 East, Silver City, NM 88061; (575) 574-0100
Still needed
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Grant County Sheriff's Office · checked 2026-08-24
The Judges
New Mexico judges are initially appointed by the Governor to fill a vacancy, then stand in a partisan election at the next general election, and thereafter face non-partisan retention elections. The Sixth Judicial District serves Grant, Hidalgo and Luna counties. Magistrate judges normally set conditions of release at first appearance.
Sixth Judicial District Court — judges sitting at the Grant County Courthouse, Silver City
- Thomas F. Stewart (Division I)
- James B. Foy (Division III)
Sixth Judicial District Court — other district judges (Luna and Hidalgo counties)
- Jennifer E. DeLaney (Division II)
- Jarod K. Hofacket (Division IV)
Grant County Magistrate Court
- D. Matt Runnels (Grant County Division I, Silver City)
- Hector C. Grijalva (Grant County Division II, Bayard)
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 2026-08-24
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
- Grant County is another New Mexico county where the elected sheriff does NOT run the jail: Corrections is a stand-alone county department under Detention Administrator Joseph Andazola, who is a non-elected department head appointed by the County Manager with the Board's concurrence.
- Roster recorded as 'yes': the county's own Corrections page publishes and links a 'Prisoner in Custody' list.
- Budget recorded as 'yes': Budget Reports archive on the county site holds Final Budgets for FY2017 through FY2021; the FY2021 PDF was opened and contains a dedicated 'Jail - Detention' fund with a Detention Center expenditure department.
- PREA recorded as 'no': the county publishes a PREA policy and reporting-procedure page and names a PREA Coordinator, but the only report link on it is labelled 'PREA Yearly Report (Missing Report)' — no audit result is actually published.
- The budget shows a 'Care of Prisoners' revenue line, indicating the county houses other agencies' prisoners, but no contract or per-diem rate schedule is published on the county site.
- No bed count, daily population, death-in-custody record, independent inspection result, bond-posting guidance, or phone/video/commissary rate schedule was found on the county's own site.
- New Mexico has no mandatory statewide jail inspection body. The New Mexico Association of Counties runs a voluntary accreditation programme; no accreditation status for Grant County was found published. NMSA 1978 Section 33-15-3, the state death-in-custody reporting statute, applies to private correctional facilities only, so this county-run jail has no state death-reporting requirement.
- Board of County Commissioners, five districts: Chris Ponce (District 1), Eloy H. Medina (District 2), Nancy Stephens (District 3), Eddie Flores (District 4), Thomas Shelley (District 5). Regular meetings 9 am on the 2nd and 4th Thursday of each month at the Grant County Administration Complex, 1400 Highway 180 E, Silver City. The Board sets all department budgets and appoints the County Manager, who appoints non-elected department heads including the Detention Administrator. Grant County levies a County Correctional Gross Receipts Tax — the FY2020-2021 final budget shows $589,000 budgeted in fund 22600 'Jail - Detention' from revenue line 41210 'Gross Receipts Tax - County Correctional'.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Grant 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