OLYMPIA, Wash. — The Thurston County Jail is running out of room, and it’s creating big problems for the sheriff’s office (TCSO).
“We’re out of room – we’re just shuffling bodies around,” said Thurston County Sheriff Derek Sanders.
Sanders says jail overcrowding is so bad that they’ve had to make more room for men, which means less room for women.
The sheriff says women considered violent and “mentally unstable” have had to be moved around.
“So what we do is we house them in areas where they’re not supposed to be,” said Sanders.
But to do that, the TCSO is enforcing booking restrictions for women.
“Domestic violence assaults and violent felonies – those are the only two that we’re accepting for women right now,” said Sanders.
KIRO 7 talked with a woman who wished to remain anonymous – after she spent a week in the jail, in an open section with around 20 non-violent women.
“But I was also told that had I showed up sooner, that it would have been pretty full,” said the woman.
Sanders says there’s a plan to expand the jail, but the funding isn’t there.
“In 2019, they got close to expanding it and when COVID hit, the population in the jail dropped, so they nixed that project. There was money for it. It was about 99% complete for getting the project up and running and going and that money has since been spent,” said Sanders.
Sanders says the jail’s capacity is 390 and they need 40 to 80 more cells to take care of the current overcrowding issues.
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