The Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections, DPS&C, links Locate a Person Incarcerated on its home page to VINELink, the national victim notification network's search for Louisiana, where custody status and release notifications are registered. Its frequently asked questions add the department's own answer for a release date: an automated system at (225) 383-4580 takes the person's name and either the date of birth or the DPS&C number and gives the release date, the facility, or the probation and parole district office the person is assigned to, with contact information for each; no date means the time calculation is not finished, since the department must receive the sentencing court's official paperwork first, and a second automated line at (225) 342-0799 handles time computation questions.
Where a Louisiana state prisoner is held is the question the system answers least simply. More than 30,000 people are serving time for state felonies, the state operated facilities hold just under 19,000, and the department relies on parish and private facilities across Louisiana to house the rest, reimbursing them; a state inmate may therefore be in a parish jail, where the local phone and mail systems apply. A person held before trial on a parish charge is the sheriff's record, found through the Louisiana parish pages.
- Locate: VINELink for custody status and notification; the automated release date line at (225) 383-4580 for the date, facility or district; the department's facility directory for every state prison, transitional work program and probation and parole office with its address and phone.
- Calls: up to 20 approved numbers on the master telephone list at a state facility, family, personal and legal contacts included, changed quarterly through the facility; billing through Securus at 1-800-844-6591, which cannot approve a contact list; local facilities use their own systems.
- Mail and money: letters addressed to the facility with the person's name and DPS&C number, no packages, publications, greeting cards, postcards, cash, stamps or hardback photos; money through MoneyGram, jpay.com, JPay kiosks, mail to JPay at P.O. Box 531370, Miami Shores, FL 33153, or (800) 574-5729.
- Parole: the Louisiana Committee on Parole, seven members within the Board of Pardons, the sole authority to grant parole, which can hear a case as early as nine months before the eligibility date the department computes.
Written by SearchSystems.net from Louisiana's own systems: the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections home page, the department's Frequently Asked Questions, the department's Facility Locations directory, the Board of Pardons and Committee on Parole guide, Parole in Louisiana, the department's Probation and Community Corrections page, each read on October 14, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.
The state facilities and where the rest are held
The facility directory lists the state prisons with their addresses and numbers: the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, (225) 655-4411; Elayn Hunt Correctional Center and the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women, both on Highway 74 in St. Gabriel; Dixon Correctional Institute in Jackson; the David Wade Correctional Center in Homer; the B.B. Rayburn Correctional Center in Angie; the Raymond Laborde Correctional Center in Cottonport; and the Allen Correctional Center in Kinder, with the Catahoula, Morehouse, Madison and Franklin parish detention centers and dozens of transitional work programs from Scotlandville to DeQuincy alongside them.
New state inmates are usually processed first through the Adult Reception and Diagnostic Center at Elayn Hunt for men or the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women before a permanent assignment, made on custody classification, bed space, medical and mental health level of care and other factors rather than geography; a transfer request goes in writing to the warden, and headquarters does not get involved. The department itself is constitutionally one body in three parts, Corrections Services, Public Safety Services with the State Police and the Office of Motor Vehicles, and the Office of Juvenile Justice.
Calls and the cell phone rule
Every person in a state facility may have up to 20 approved numbers on a master telephone list covering family, personal and legal contacts, changed quarterly under the facility's direction. Securus Technologies provides the phone service, and family members set up billing or report trouble at 1-800-844-6591, though neither Securus nor its site can approve a contact list. State felons housed in parish or private facilities use the phone systems those facilities run.
No one in custody may possess or use a cellular telephone; the department warns that sending or bringing one results in arrest for introducing contraband into a correctional facility, with a fine of up to $10,000 and up to ten years with or without hard labor.
Mail, packages and money
On intake a person receives the department's rules on mail on the Notification of Mail Handling form. Family and friends may send correspondence addressed to the facility with the person's name and DPS&C number on the envelope, but not packages, publications, greeting cards or postcards, and not cash, stamps or hardback photographs, which are rejected, with cash confiscated. Packages come only through the approved vendor: the FAQ names Union Supply Direct at LAinmatepackage.com, and the home page describes the Canteen Package Program through Access Securepak by Keefe Group, both offering pre approved food, hygiene and personal property items that family, friends or the person may order.
Money reaches an account at MoneyGram walk up locations, online at jpay.com, at JPay kiosks, by mail to JPay at P.O. Box 531370, Miami Shores, FL 33153, or by calling (800) 574-5729. Funds may not come from other inmates or their families without the warden's prior approval, nor from former inmates or their families, or employees and theirs; a person with an account question writes to Inmate Banking at the facility, and families are given no account information.
Visiting
A prospective visitor files an application, never by fax, completely and honestly, and receives the visiting rules with it; a parent or guardian applies on behalf of a minor. Everyone is screened for criminal history before approval and regularly afterward, and convictions or pending charges may make a person ineligible. A visitor may be on only one inmate's list per institution unless a family member of more than one, with the proof on the inmate and family; visitors 18 and older show picture identification; only enough cash for vending machines comes in, and money for an inmate's account goes only through the JPay kiosks; vehicles, possessions and persons are searched without warning for weapons, cell phones, drugs, alcohol and escape devices; visiting areas are run as family spaces with a dress code sent in the application packet, disabilities are accommodated with advance notice, the inmate may refuse a visit, and staff may end one for security.
Visiting is a privilege whose abuse can bring termination, loss of the inmate's privileges, a ban or criminal charges. A person convicted of a sex crime against a minor family member may visit no minor at all, including their own children; a person whose victim was a minor outside the family may, at the warden's discretion and with the legal guardian's written request and presence, visit their own biological child.
Grievances, discipline and medical information
A person with a complaint speaks to staff first, then writes, then uses the Administrative Remedy Procedure, which the department and every local jail holding state inmates maintain for a formal written review of conditions of confinement, injuries, medical care, time computation and challenges to rules; disciplinary matters follow the Offender Rulebook, with appeals filed at the facility where the hearing was held. Medical and mental health information is released only under regulation and with release forms on file, and then only in general terms by phone; abuse or mistreatment that puts a person in immediate danger is reported to the warden.
Parole: the Committee, the hearing and supervision
The Board of Pardons' Parole in Louisiana guide explains the path. The Committee on Parole, seven members appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Senate, is the sole authority to grant parole, which lets a person serve the last part of a sentence in the community under the Division of Probation and Parole. The department computes every sentence and the parole eligibility date, with disputes resolved in court, and the Committee may hold a public hearing as early as nine months before that date; eligibility means only that a hearing is earned.
Committee staff gather arrest and court records, presentence investigations, psychological evaluations, treatment and prison records, and input from judges, law enforcement and victims, and the panel hears the inmate and other parties in a meeting open under the state's open meetings laws, announcing its decision at the end with a written disposition. Misconduct inside, especially late in a sentence, weighs against release, parole can be rescinded before release on new evidence, and a parolee signs written conditions, pays a monthly supervisory fee the Committee may waive for hardship, and returns to prison for the rest of the sentence on revocation.
The Division of Probation and Parole runs 21 offices with 510 officers supervising more than 60,000 people, 99 percent of them felons, and the Transitional Work Program, the former work release, opens to most inmates up to four years before discharge.
Reading a Louisiana result
A VINELink status and the release date line together say whether a person is in the department's custody, where, and when the computed release falls, with the department's own caution that no date means the calculation is not done. The place may be a state prison or a parish jail holding state inmates, which decides whose phone and mail rules apply; the DPS&C number carries the mail, the JPay deposit and the release date call, and the Committee on Parole, not the department, decides an early release.
Questions about finding an inmate in Louisiana
Related Louisiana records
The department's records are among the Louisiana records this site covers: the Louisiana arrest records guide explains what a booking makes public, the court records guide covers the clerks of court, the sex offender registry guide covers the State Police registry, and the Louisiana parish pages list each sheriff and jail.