Chester County, South Carolina — The Jail, the Sheriff, the Judges

The Detention Center

Not found

Operated byNot stated on the pages read
Detention center address (sheriff's site)2740 Dawson Drive, Chester, SC 29706
Detention center phone (sheriff's site)(803) 581-2602 or (803) 385-2606
Office hours (sheriff's site)Monday - Friday 8 a.m. - 5 p.m.
FY2026-27 county budget340 Detention Center, Personnel: $2,079,914; 301 Sheriff's Department total $6,417,994
Facility studyCounty Council workshop on 17 March 2022 to discuss a study from Mosely's Architect regarding the Detention Center
Jail AdministratorTarkeceya Neal (detention center director, per SC Sheriffs' Association directory)

Source: Chester County Sheriff's Office - detention center information page · checked 2026-09-29

Transparency rating

1/10Closed

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

This rates disclosure, not conduct — what Chester County publishes about a jail its taxpayers own, checked 2026-09-29. 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 Max Dorsey

CurrentNamed on the sheriff's own Meet the Sheriff page
How he took officeAppointed Sheriff of Chester County by Governor Henry D. McMaster on May 7, 2019 (sheriff's page)
Runs the jailNot stated on the pages read; the detention center's contact page is on the sheriff's site, while the county budget carries a separate Detention Center department

Still needed

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

Source: Chester County Sheriff's Office - Meet the Sheriff · checked 2026-09-29

The Judges

South Carolina's circuit court judges are elected by the General Assembly and hear felony cases. For most charges a magistrate sets bond soon after arrest; for offenses punishable by death or life imprisonment only a circuit judge can.

Who sets bail in Chester County

Circuit Court: South Carolina's Sixth Judicial Circuit, which also serves Lancaster and Fairfield. Circuit judges are elected by the General Assembly to six-year terms and hear felony cases; for offenses punishable by death or life imprisonment only a circuit judge can set bond.
Magistrate Court: the Chester County magistrates. For most charges a magistrate sets bond soon after arrest.

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 2026-09-29

The County Council

They pay for the jail. Depending on the county, the sheriff or a county detention department runs it.

What they controlThe county budget that funds the detention center and the sheriff's office, and the jail building itself. In counties where the sheriff has handed the jail to the county, the council's administrator runs it.
What they don'tDay-to-day operations where the sheriff keeps the jail (S.C. Code 24-5-10). The state Department of Corrections inspects every detention center each year (S.C. Code 24-9-20).
The boardChester County Council →
Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →

Notes on the record

Examined: the sheriff's detention information page, Meet the Sheriff page, and the county's home, finance, budget-ordinance and council agendas pages opened.
The sheriff's detention page gives address, phones, hours and a mission statement only; it does not print a formal facility name, capacity, visitation, bond, fee or PREA information.
The county's FY2026-27 budget ordinance shows a 340 Detention Center line (Personnel $2,079,914) and a 301 Sheriff's Department line ($6,417,994).
The county home page lists no detention center department.
What was tried: https://www.chesterscsheriff.com/ (refused, PROVENANCE_REQUIRED); https://www.chesterscsheriff.com/resources (refused, robots.txt); the Jail Tracker link could not be reached because our reader saw no link URLs on the sheriff pages, so the roster was not verified.
Detention director name comes from the South Carolina Sheriffs' Association directory, not a county page.
State inspection/oversight: The South Carolina Department of Corrections must inspect every county detention center each year and send written reports to county officials (S.C. Code 24-9-20). A county earns the inspections mark here only if it posts such a report on its own site.

These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Chester 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 is elected. So are the county council members who pay for the jail.

Names verified 2026-09-29 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered