Marion County Sheriff Kevin Cripps says more federal prisoners are headed to the county jail. He’s been concerned about a lower number of federal inmates recently that could lead to a shortfall in the county’s projection of $600,000 a year from holding the federal prisoners.
Cripps says with the help of the US Marshal’s Service the jail will not only house federal inmates in the future for the federal courts in Southern Illinois but now Eastern Missouri as well.
“Excited when I talked to them this morning and they said we would get you filled up. I told them I would guarantee them 20 beds, but currently we have about 30 beds available. We get paid $65 for every federal inmate. And they also pay us $25 an hour for the officers doing transports and anything we have to do. We make pretty decent revenue coming from the federal government on those things. Also it kind of eases my mind for the future concerns about the employees and so forth.”
Cripps feared the jail’s staff size might have to be cut if the number of federal inmates didn’t pick up. There are currently only 16 federal inmates in custody where the budget is figured on 25 federal prisoners. The total jail population is 74 with one juvenile being held out of county.
