The person living it
Someone with serious mental illness, in their own words, at every stage from arrest to reentry.
First profile coming
Active campaign · Let Families In
4 years. 0 in-person family visits.
The $575 million Marion County jail opened with video-only visits. Families were told it was temporary. Four years later, only attorneys and professionals get in the room. We want to know why, and we want it changed.
2022Year the jail opened with video-only family visits
$575MCost of the Community Justice Campus, which includes the jail
0 of 2Sheriff candidates who have publicly committed to bringing visits back
13%Lower risk of a new felony conviction for people who got any visit (Minnesota study)
Latest stories
All stories →- A caucus will choose Marion County's sheriff for the rest of 2026. Two things that sheriff can do for families before Jan. 1.Accountability · November 9, 2026
Whoever runs the jail until Sheriff-elect Williams takes office can release the records families have asked for and hand him a ready plan for in-person visits.
- Sheriff-elect Williams inherits a jail where families can't visit. Here is a plan for his first 100 days.Accountability · November 4, 2026
Kelvis Williams takes office Jan. 1 with a jail capped at 2,400 people and a visiting room closed to families since 2022. Other new sheriffs reopened theirs within months, starting with the people in mental health housing.
- If Marion County's treatment courts close, the wait moves to the jail. Families there still can't visit.In the news · November 2, 2026
The county's reentry and drug court has stopped taking applicants, and mental health court could close by the end of 2027. People who are not diverted wait in a jail where families can only visit by video.
- Drugs got into the Marion County jail in court clothes. Families still can't visit.In the news · October 23, 2026
Five people are charged with smuggling Suboxone into the Adult Detention Center, and no family visit played a part. Other jails show how to screen visitors and let families in.
- The budget passed. The visiting room is still closed.Accountability · October 21, 2026
The 2027 budget cuts $260,000 from help for people leaving the jail and says nothing about family visits. A new sheriff, the release plan and the first quarterly report all arrive in January.
- Tonight's budget vote, and three things the Council can still do for families at the jailAccountability · October 19, 2026
The 2027 budget reaches its final vote unchanged so far. A written question, visit counts in the Sheriff's quarterly reports, and copay rules the Council already approves need no budget line.
- Where other sheriffs started when they brought family visits backComparison · October 16, 2026
A mental health unit in Savannah, low-level charges in Denver, one visit a week in Charlotte. How four jails reopened their visiting rooms, before Monday's budget vote.
- Four jail records the Council can ask for before the Oct. 19 voteAccountability · October 14, 2026
A quarterly jail commissary report is due to the county's fiscal body Oct. 15. The jail's video visit contract, copay totals and family visit counts are still not public.
- Other sheriffs brought family visits back. Marion County's next sheriff can too.Comparison · October 12, 2026
Genesee and Washtenaw counties in Michigan and Shasta County in California reopened in-person visits. Indiana's prisons offer them. Marion County's jail is still video only.
- $15 copays for jail prescriptions, and no exception for mental illnessExplainer · October 7, 2026
The Marion County jail charges $15 for prescriptions and other care, with no exception for psychiatric medication. The Council approves the rule.
- Book ahead, no walk-ins, no refunds: the rules for family visits at the Marion County jailExplainer · October 5, 2026
The Sheriff's Office's own rules for family video visits, read as a family with someone in a mental health unit would read them.
- Monday's budget hearing, and the jail question the Council has not askedAccountability · October 2, 2026
Family visits have not come up in 2027 budget meetings. Before the Oct. 19 vote, one written question from one councilor would put an answer on paper.
- Where the candidates for sheriff stand on family visits, five weeks outAccountability · September 30, 2026
Vaughn and Williams agree the jail holds too many people sentenced to state prison. Neither has yet said in public whether families will get in-person visits back.
- Sentenced to prison, still in the county jail, and still no family visitsComparison · September 29, 2026
258 people sentenced to Indiana prisons were waiting in Marion County's jail, where families can visit only by video. In state prison, families can visit in person.
- Federal rules ended jail commissions on video visits. Marion County's visiting room is still closed.Explainer · September 26, 2026
What changed this spring, what it means for families paying for screen time, and the questions it raises for the county budget and the next sheriff.
A continuing investigation
Follow the investigation
The Mad and the Bad
When someone with serious mental illness is charged with a crime in Indiana, the system sorts them into one of three boxes. We're investigating what each box costs the person inside it.
01Guilty
Convicted and sentenced like anyone else. The illness may or may not come up.
02Guilty but mentally ill
The court recognizes the illness. Indiana law still requires the same sentence as a plain guilty verdict.
03Not responsible by reason of insanity
Found not responsible, then committed to a state hospital with no fixed end date.
Stand With
About these profiles →The family beside them
The parents, partners and children who make the calls, learn the rules, and serve a sentence of their own.
First profile comingThe one who got it right
The deputy, nurse, public defender or judge who treated someone in crisis as a person. We name the good too.
First profile comingWorth Reading
Full list →- 'Guilty But Mentally Ill' doesn't protect against harsh sentencesNPR, 2016
A clear, short introduction to the verdict at the center of The Mad and the Bad.
- Punishing the Insane: The Verdict of Guilty but Mentally IllJournal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 2002
Psychiatrists Melville and Naimark on what the GBMI label adds, and what it fails to add.
- Not Guilty, Yet Continuously ConfinedAmerican Criminal Law Review, Georgetown
How a successful insanity defense can lead to confinement longer than a prison sentence.
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