Minnehaha County jail numbers tell the story about crime in the city

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — Sioux Falls city leaders and law enforcement officials say violent crime per capita went down in 2024, despite a record of 16 homicides last year.Tuesday they held a news conference detailing crime statistics.

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But when it comes to violent crimes and other felonies in Sioux Falls, the jail numbers and the inmates who are being housed there tell the story.

“Our numbers in the jail are holding fairly consistent at 396 Minnehaha County inmates,” warden Jeff Gromer said.

Minnehaha County Chief Deputy Sheriff Jeff Gromer painted a picture to us today of just how many inmates are in jail.

Besides the 396, the jail is also currently holding 66 inmates for the U.S. Marshals Service and 48 for Lincoln County.

Gromer says most of them are serious alleged offenders.

In 2019, the county added 320 beds to the existing 400-bed count.

Gromer says that expansion has helped.

“So the fact that our numbers are still trending below our projections at the time of our expansion is really a good thing for the county and sheriff’s office,” Gromer said.

The expansion also allows the jail to offer new programs to inmates, including drug and alcohol addiction help and community work projects.

“Which really affords us the ability to one: get people back out into the community working and manage through those programs to help maintain our jail numbers where they are at,” Gromer said.

As the federal government continues to arrest illegal immigrants in a nationwide crackdown, Gromer says he doesn’t think that’ll have much of an impact on the inmate numbers.

“In the jail, we have not seen a significant increase and I don’t envision that we will,” Gromer said.

Gromer says the jail currently only has three inmates who are being detained for ICE and they can only be held for 72 hours before they’re transferred out.