Jefferson County, Oklahoma — The Jail, the Sheriff, the Judges

The Detention Center

The county publishes no formal name for this facility.

Operated byJefferson County Sheriff
County-published nameNone. The county sheriff page lists a detention contact but never names the facility
Detention contactdetention@jeffersonsheriff-ok.gov (listed on the county's Sheriff page)
Sheriff's office address218 N Main St, Waurika, OK 73573
Statutory duty as written by the county'Has power and authority to operate the County Jail'
County Jail budget FY2024$90,203 appropriated / $89,720 expended
Jail-ST fund FY2024$228,012 appropriated / $227,761 expended

Source: Jefferson County — official source · checked August 21, 2026

Transparency rating

0/10Closed

✗The jail is named — not published
✗Who is in custody — not published
✗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

This rates disclosure, not conduct — what Jefferson County publishes about a jail its taxpayers own, checked August 21, 2026. Nothing here says the jail is run well or badly. Every mark moves the moment the county posts the document.

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

The Sheriff

Sheriff Michael Bryant

NoteWritten by the county itself as 'Michael Bryant / County Sheriff'. Corroborated by . NAME CHANGED SINCE LAST AUDIT: the Oklahoma State Auditor & Inspector's FY2024 Jefferson County financial audit lists 'County Sheriff - Jeremie Wilson'.

Still needed

Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail

Source: Jefferson County Sheriff's Office · checked August 21, 2026

The Judges

Oklahoma elects its district judges in nonpartisan elections. District and associate district judges set bond and decide who waits in this jail.

District Court, Judicial District 5

Associate District Judge Dennis Gay (Jefferson County)
District Judge Scott Meaders (resident of Comanche County; serves the whole 5th District)
District Judge Grant Sheperd (resident of Comanche County; serves the whole 5th District)
District Judge Jay Walker (resident of Comanche County; serves the whole 5th District)
District Judge G. Russell (resident of Stephens County; serves the whole 5th District)

Jefferson County Courthouse, 220 N. Main St., Waurika, OK 73573 (Court Clerk Kimberly Berry, 220 N. Main St. 3rd Floor)

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 August 21, 2026

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

DEAD SHERIFF DOMAIN: the sheriff's office uses @jeffersonsheriff-ok.gov email addresses (dispatch@, detention@, patrol@) published on the county site, but serves only a parked 'lander' page with no content. The .gov domain is registered and in use for mail but has no working website.
Sheriff of record changed between the FY2024 state audit (Jeremie Wilson) and the county's current page plus the Oklahoma Sheriffs' Association (Michael Bryant).
The county names the sheriff and asserts his authority to operate the county jail, but publishes no jail name, roster, capacity, budget, inspection, PREA, bond or fee information.
The county's /fees page publishes only County Assessor and County Clerk fee schedules - no sheriff or jail fees.
County site runs on the okcounties.org (KellPro) shared county portal platform.
OSDH jail inspection reports are published only inside a JavaScript-gated Box folder linked from ; the listing could not be enumerated without a browser.
The meetings page filters offer only 'Agenda' as a document type - no Minutes category exists - and only one document (a Board of County Commissioners agenda dated 08/17/2026) was posted at the time of review.

These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Jefferson 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.

The sheriff is on your ballot

The county election board runs the polling place in Jefferson County and prints the ballot the sheriff’s name is on. Links from the Oklahoma State Election Board and vote.gov.

Names verified August 21, 2026 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered