The Detention Center
Not found
- Operated byNot found
- No county websiteFaulk County has no county-maintained official website. Confirmed twice: the South Dakota Association of County Officials directory lists Faulk without a hyperlink ('Those Counties without a link do not maintain a website'), and a direct search for a faulk.sdcounties.org or equivalent official site returned no such page — only commercial inmate-search sites, a state judicial-branch page, and the Sheriffs' Association page.
- 2020 Census snapshotFaulk Co. Jail population 4 on April 1, 2020, per the state-layer research citing the Census facility file — the only confirmation found that Faulk County operates a jail at all
Source: South Dakota Association of County Officials — County List · checked 2026-08-25
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
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 Brent Koens
- Office addressPO Box 157, 924 Lafoon Avenue, Faulkton, SD 57438
- How the office is filledElected countywide, four-year term (SDCL 7-7-1.1)
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: South Dakota Sheriffs' Association — Faulk County · checked 2026-08-25
The Judges
South Dakota circuit judges are elected in a nonpartisan election for an eight-year term (S.D. Const. Art. V, section 7; SDCL 16-6-3); a mid-term vacancy is filled by the Governor from two or more nominees of the Judicial Qualifications Commission. Magistrate judges, who in practice handle most rural first appearances and bail-setting under SDCL 16-12B-7, are not elected: the presiding judge of the circuit nominates them and the Supreme Court approves or disapproves the appointment (SDCL 16-12B-1.2); full-time magistrates serve four-year terms, part-time magistrates serve at the presiding judge's pleasure (SDCL 16-12B-1.3). Named circuit or magistrate judges for Faulk County were not located from a source opened in this pass.
Circuit Court — Fifth Circuit
- Not found
Magistrate Court
- Not found
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-08-25
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
Notes on the record
- Faulk County has no county-maintained website, so none of the ten transparency checks can be satisfied by a county-published source; all are recorded 'no'. This is the finding, confirmed by directory listing and by search, not an unresolved gap.
- State-layer finding applies: no state agency inspects adult county jails in South Dakota.
- Board of County Commissioners under SDCL ch. 7-8. Faulk County has no county-maintained official website, so no board or minutes URL, and no commissioner names, were found.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Faulk 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 2026-08-25 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered