Colorado Sheriff Appropriates $349K of Unclaimed Money in Ex-Prisoners’ Accounts

by Joe Watson

When is a check too small to cash? It’s when you've just been released from jail and hope to get as far away as possible. So says the Pueblo County, Colorado Sheriff's Office bank account, which last year had more than $349,000 in unclaimed jail inmate funds from the last 20 years.

Since then, the sheriff's office has given Pueblo County commissioners $106,000 of that money for the county's general fund and spent $203,000 on upgrading the jail's dishwashers and laundry machines. And in May 2013, Sheriff Kirk Taylor used $30,000 of the remaining balance to begin renovating the jail's showers.

"We did a lot of legal research on it and got legal opinions from the county attorney's office," Taylor said. "It was my position that it was abandoned money and that it should go to [the county]."

The money was left behind by former Pueblo County Jail prisoners—the change in their pockets upon their initial bookings and odd amounts left over from commissary purchases. Until a couple of years ago, ex-prisoners were issued refunds via check, but the jail now issues debit cards upon their release.

Before spending the money on jail improvements, the sheriff's office says it sent letters to the last known addresses of 352 former prisoners, informing them of the unclaimed funds. But, according to the sheriff's office, only 43 people responded, receiving about $4,300 in refunds.

Since 2007, Taylor says he has also used $480,000 in profits from commissary purchases—plus a $1.2 million federal grant—to upgrade the jail's electrical and security systems.

Source: The Associated Press

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