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

The Detention Center

The county publishes no formal name for this facility.

Operated byNot found
County publishes a jail nameNo — no jail, detention or inmate page exists on either county-run site
Name as the State Department of Health wPAYNE COUNTY DETENTION FACILITY (OSDH provider ID DET-095)
Jail address (per the state inspection r606 S Husband, Stillwater, OK 74074 — the county courthouse address
Sheriff's Department phone405-372-4522 (per the county contact page)
Population at last state inspection245 (census on 06/15/2026)
Rated capacity416, as determined by the Oklahoma State Fire Marshal (per the 06/15/2026 OSDH inspection) — the county publishes no capacity figure of its own
State inspectionOklahoma inspects this jail. Read the state report →

Source: Payne 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 Payne 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

Since then

Not found

The Sheriff

Sheriff Joe Harper

NoteListed in the Oklahoma State Election Board 2024 Roster of State and County Officers as 'Sheriff - Joe Harper, R, Cushing'.

Still needed

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

Source: Payne 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 9

Hon. Jason Reese — District Judge, 9th Judicial District (chambers: Logan County)
Hon. Michael Kulling — Associate District Judge, Payne County
Hon. Jill Ochs — Special Judge, Payne County
Hon. Bryan Plank — Special Judge, Payne County
Hon. Diane Vaughan — Special Judge, Logan County

Payne County Courthouse, 606 S. Husband Street, Stillwater, OK 74074. Court Clerk Lori Allen, 606 S.

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'S WEBSITE: paynecountyok.gov — an official .gov domain used in county e-mail addresses — served nothing but an 'Under Construction' placeholder as of August 2026.
This is the sharpest contrast in the group: the county's civil side (paynecounty.org) maintains a detailed, current, multi-body agenda archive, while its jail side publishes nothing at all.
Neither county site names the sheriff. The only official source for the name 'Joe Harper' is the Oklahoma State Election Board's 2024 officer roster.
The county does not name its jail; only the state does (Payne County Detention Facility).
Payne is one of only three counties in this group whose jail has a State Fire Marshal rated capacity on record (416, alongside Muskogee's 282); the census of 245 was well within it and the 06/15/2026 inspection found no deficiencies.
The commissioner pages publish agendas and meeting-notice schedules but no approved minutes.
Payne County runs a well-maintained agenda archive.

These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Payne 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 Payne 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