Search Big Sandy Regional Detention Center Inmates

Big Sandy Jail Overview

Big Sandy Regional Detention Center is the primary jail channel for Lawrence County arrests even though the building is in Paintsville. The regional jail serves Johnson, Lawrence, Magoffin, and Martin counties, and the official jail site lists sheriff-office phone numbers for all four counties. For a Lawrence County arrest by the sheriff, Louisa police, Kentucky State Police, or another local agency, the custody search normally starts with BSRDC rather than a separate jail in Louisa.

The facility is operated as a local secure regional jail. Research sources describe the population as a mix of pretrial detainees, local sentenced inmates, Kentucky state inmates housed in a county or regional jail, and detainees from the four member counties. That mix matters for lookup work. A person may begin on the BSRDC jail roster after booking, later move to the Kentucky Online Offender Lookup after a state sentence or transfer, or appear in a federal or immigration locator if custody leaves the local jail system.

Big Sandy Inmate Lookup

The official local lookup is the Public Safety Cloud JailTracker roster for Big Sandy, reached from the BSRDC inmate-search frame. That roster is the right first stop for Lawrence County jail records when the person is still in regional custody. The frame points into the JailTracker app, and the research found search fields for first, middle, and last name, offender ID, permanent ID, intake date range, release date range when enabled, type, gender when enabled, and agency when the multi-agency list is active.

The JailTracker app can show list results and a detail panel. Available fields can include agency, name, gender, offender identifiers, intake date, release date, status, photo support, VINELink linkouts, print, and PDF export. Because the live inspection did not return a full sample inmate record, exact charge and bond labels should be checked on the active roster or with the jail before relying on them for court or release decisions.

1. Open the official BSRDC inmate-search frame and wait for the JailTracker roster to load.
2. Search by last name first, then add first name, intake dates, or agency if too many records appear.
3. Confirm that the agency or booking context matches Lawrence County when the roster lists more than one county.
4. Open the detail view and check status, intake date, release date if shown, identifiers, image availability, and any listed detail sections.
5. If no match appears, call BSRDC at 606-297-5245 and ask about recent booking, release, transfer, or name-spelling issues.

The official BSRDC roster frame shows the facility's own path into the JailTracker search.

The image shows why the Big Sandy Regional Detention Center roster is the local custody doorway, while court dates, state prison status, and victim notices still require separate systems.

Big Sandy Jail Population

Current population work should avoid treating any unsourced number as a rated-bed capacity. The research did not locate an official rated capacity for Big Sandy Regional Detention Center in the inspected facility pages. It did locate population context: a historic local point count of 215 from a Prison Policy Initiative Census 2020 correctional-population source dated 12/31/2013, administrator-reported averages in local reporting, and the KDOC weekly jail report archive as the official recurring source for Kentucky jail bed and population categories.

Local reporting cited in the research said the jail averaged about 240 people from June 2021 through January 2023, averaged 208 since January 2023 in one later account, averaged 216 over the six months before a September 2025 board update, and averaged 241 in November 2025. The same reporting gave a count of 225 as of December 18, 2025. These figures are useful trend context, not a substitute for the current KDOC weekly jail report.

Note: Use the latest KDOC weekly jail report for active bed, custody, controlled-intake, parole-violator, federal-inmate, and capacity-percentage columns.

Big Sandy Jail Contacts

Custody questions go first to the regional jail. Arrest-agency records may still belong to the agency that made the arrest, so a Lawrence County sheriff arrest can require a separate records request after custody is confirmed. The Lawrence County Sheriff's Office is listed by the current county government page under Sheriff Chuck T. Jackson, and BSRDC lists the sheriff number in its area law-enforcement contacts. Court dates and bond orders, however, belong to the Kentucky Court of Justice and the Lawrence County Circuit Court Clerk.

Big Sandy Visitation Schedule

BSRDC publishes a short visitation rule: visits are through video visitation weekly from 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. The inspected page did not publish per-inmate frequency, visit length, remote-versus-onsite distinctions, fees, dress code, child visitor rules, or holiday exceptions. Confirm account setup, approved visitor status, identification rules, and any temporary lockdown limits with BSRDC before scheduling or traveling from Lawrence County.

The BSRDC video visitation page supplies the published visit window.

The visitation screenshot supports the limited schedule language, so the page does not add unverified visitor rules that BSRDC did not publish in the inspected sources.

Big Sandy Phone and Money

Money deposits and phone access have BSRDC-specific details. The jail links commissary funding to TouchPay. Before a new person funds an inmate account, BSRDC says the funder must email administrator@bsrdc.com with the inmate name, cardholder name as it appears on the card, gender, relationship to the inmate, and address unless the funder is already on the inmate's contact list. That extra email step is easy to miss and can affect how quickly money is accepted.

BSRDC links inmate phone service to CIDNET. The inspected pages did not publish calling rates. Mail rules were also not posted in the inspected navigation, so the facility address should be treated only as a starting point. Call the jail before mailing anything to confirm inmate-name format, ID number format, prohibited items, legal-mail handling, photo limits, and return-address rules.

The BSRDC commissary page documents the TouchPay process.

The screenshot backs the TouchPay and email-before-funding details, which are more specific than a standard jail deposit instruction.

Big Sandy Booking Records

A Lawrence County arrest usually moves through arrest, transport to BSRDC, intake, search and property inventory, fingerprinting, booking photo, medical or mental-health screening, classification, and housing. BSRDC's public pages do not publish a full intake checklist, so process details should be confirmed with the jail. The roster may show the jail side of the event, while the court record shows filed charges, docket dates, judges, bond orders, amendments, dismissals, and dispositions.

The BSRDC FAQ routes court-date questions to the Kentucky Court of Justice docket tab, not to jail staff as the final source. For a broader custody walkthrough, the county jail records page explains how the roster differs from later court and state corrections records: Lawrence County jail inmate records. If the person is sentenced or transferred, the search should shift to KOOL. If federal or immigration custody is involved, use the BOP inmate locator or ICE Online Detainee Locator rather than the BSRDC roster.

Booking

The jail intake event after arrest, including identity checks and a custody record.

Detainer

A hold or request from another agency that may affect release even when local bond exists.

Controlled intake

A Kentucky state-prison intake category that can affect county and regional jail populations.

KOOL

Kentucky Online Offender Lookup, the statewide system for KDOC custody and supervision records.

Big Sandy Jail Records Reform

Kentucky public access starts with official channels and written requests when a record is not online. KRS 61.870 defines public records and key open-records terms, while KRS 61.872 gives eligible Kentucky residents a right to inspect public records subject to exemptions and procedure. KRS 441.025 addresses county responsibility for incarceration and allows regional jail participation, which fits Lawrence County's use of BSRDC.

The most concrete recent reform in the research is a November 2023 U.S. Attorney's Office ADA agreement with the Big Sandy Regional Jail Authority. The agreement addressed access to FDA-approved medications for opioid use disorder when medically appropriate. That fact should be read as a medical-access and ADA compliance reform, not as a claim that every medical, grievance, or program detail is published online.

BSRDC also has an inmate-programs navigation page, but the inspected source text was limited. Program access, medical requests, grievance steps, attorney visits, and legal mail should be confirmed directly with the jail. Kentucky regulations such as 501 KAR 3:060 and 501 KAR 3:140 supply state-level rules for full-service jails.