Pennsylvania inmate search

The state prison system in Pennsylvania is separate from local jails. The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections says the state locator doesn't include anyone held in a county facility. Local jails are run by county or city agencies instead.

For instance, oversight of the Allegheny County Jail sits with the Allegheny County Bureau of Corrections, not the sheriff. Renewal, Passages to Recovery, and the main jail all belong to its system. In the southeast of Pennsylvania, the Delaware County jail has a single prison location on Cheyney Road. Close by is a city agency, the Philadelphia Department of Prisons. It runs 4 facilities on State Road, among them the Detention Center and the Riverside Correctional Facility.

Lookup rules are set by each local jail system in Pennsylvania. In Philadelphia, the Philadelphia Department of Prisons inmate locator takes a police identification number or a full name and date of birth. The results tell you which one of the 4 city facilities is holding the person.

The process differs in other counties. Custody lookups in Delaware County go through VINELink. Allegheny County staff give inmate locations over the phone. You can get booking dates by calling the jail at 412-350-2000 or Arraignment Court at 412-350-3240.

If the arrest just happened, phone the jail yourself, since the booking process takes time.

The online Inmate and Parolee Locator is run by the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, or DOC. It finds people who are serving sentences in state prisons. A separate tab, the Department Supervised Individual Locator, covers parolees. Someone released from prison early under state supervision is called a parolee.

A county jail roster isn't the same thing as this search. People go to local jails right after an arrest, but state prisons take them once a court sentences them to state custody. People kept in a county facility or another state won't show up in the DOC search.

With Pennsylvania VINE, you can find an offender and follow changes in custody. It gives DOC custody status updates, and participating county facilities like the Delaware County jail are covered.

Registration for custody status alerts is free. If you need help finding someone, signing up for notifications, or reaching local victim services, call the toll free support line at 1-866-972-7284. That phone line is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Crime victims can also register for updates through the Pennsylvania Office of Victim Advocate at 800-563-6399.

Courts use 5 release types under 234 Pa. Code Rule 524 and Rules 520, 523, and 527:

• Release on recognizance means promising to come back to court without paying money.
• Release under nonmonetary conditions.
• Release through an unsecured bail bond, with money owed only when the person misses court.
• Release with nominal bail.
• Release under a monetary condition.

Prisoners are generally bailable by sufficient sureties under sections 5701, 5702, and 5741 through 5748 of 42 Pa.C.S. Chapter 57. Court attendance is guaranteed by a bail bond. By pledging money in exchange for payment, known as a premium or fee, a bail bondsman serves as a surety. Licensing bail bondsmen falls to a state department, while the court of common pleas, along with the clerk of courts, manages county registration.