Ohio

The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC) runs the state’s prison system — about 28 correctional institutions, two of which (Lake Erie and North Central) are privately operated on the state’s behalf, plus a third private prison (Northeast Ohio Correctional Center) that holds some Ohio inmates alongside federal detainees. The system holds roughly 45,000 people across three regions. ODRC’s current materials use the terms incarcerated adult and incarcerated person; this site uses neutral terms.

Where a person is held turns first on the offense and sentence. A felony sentence to state prison (generally more than a year) places a person in ODRC custody; pretrial detention and short, usually misdemeanor, sentences are served in a county jail run by one of Ohio’s 88 county sheriffs, which sets its own visiting, mail, and phone rules. A person typically moves from a county jail, through sentencing, to an ODRC reception center, and then to a permanent prison.

Newly received people are processed at a reception center first. Most men go through the Correctional Reception Center (CRC) in Orient; men from Stark, Summit, and Cuyahoga counties go through Lorain Correctional Institution in Grafton; and women go through the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville. Visiting is restricted during reception, and the person transfers to a permanent prison after classification, so a visit plan is built around the permanent facility rather than the reception center. Ohio keeps the death penalty in law but has not carried out an execution since 2018, under a governor’s pause; men under a death sentence are held at Ross Correctional Institution, women at the Ohio Reformatory for Women, and the execution chamber is at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville. Franklin Medical Center in Columbus is the system’s medical hospital, and the Ohio State Penitentiary in Youngstown is its highest-security prison.

To find where someone is held, search the ODRC Offender Search by name or number. If a person is not listed there, they are most likely in a county jail (or federal custody) — Ohio has no statewide jail locator, so search the relevant county sheriff’s roster. Independent inspection of Ohio’s prisons is handled by the Office of Correctional Facility Inspection Services in the Ohio Attorney General’s Office. Use the guides below for the statewide rules at ODRC prisons, or go straight to a specific facility.