Wisconsin Inmate Search: The Offender Locator and the Division of Adult Institutions' Rules

Written by SearchSystems.net from Wisconsin's own systems: the Wisconsin Department of Corrections Offender Locator, the Division of Adult Institutions General Information page, the department's Offender Information page, the department's Money, Mail and Property page, the department's Visiting Information page, the department's Adult Facilities page, each read on October 14, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.

The facilities

The adult facilities page lists 19 adult institutions, Chippewa Valley Correctional Treatment Facility, Columbia, Dodge, Fox Lake, Green Bay, Jackson, Kettle Moraine, the Milwaukee Secure Detention Facility, New Lisbon, Oakhill, Oshkosh, Prairie du Chien, Racine, the Racine Youthful Offender Correctional Facility, Redgranite, Stanley, the Sturtevant Transitional Facility, Waupun and the Wisconsin Secure Program Facility; the 14 centers of the Wisconsin Correctional Center System, Black River, Drug Abuse, Felmers O.

Chaney, Flambeau, Gordon, John C. Burke, Kenosha, Marshall E. Sherrer, McNaughton, Oregon, Sanger B. Powers, St. Croix, Thompson and Winnebago; the Wisconsin Women's Correctional System, Taycheedah, the Milwaukee Women's Correctional Center and the Robert E. Ellsworth Correctional Center; and the Wisconsin Resource Center run by the Department of Health Services. Intake, assessment and evaluation happens at Dodge, the Milwaukee Secure Detention Facility or Taycheedah, and a person in reception status at Dodge may not receive vendor orders until classified to general population.

The same page records the ICSolutions tablet rollout under way since March 2024, with Fox Lake, Racine, Kettle Moraine, Dodge, the Milwaukee Secure Detention Facility, Taycheedah, Ellsworth, Sturtevant and the Milwaukee Women's Correctional Center still to transition when read, and ICS hardware improvements in June 2025 after months of dropped calls at peak hours.

Back to the topics

Mail: TextBehind and the two addresses

Personal mail by the Postal Service goes to TextBehind for processing, addressed with the sender's return name and address and the person's full first and last name, DOC number and correctional facility name, not abbreviated, at P.O. Box 189, Phoenix, MD 21131; an envelope with incomplete information is undeliverable and returned, and personal mail that reaches the institution is returned to the sender. People with tablets receive electronic photos through messaging.

Legal mail, identifiable as coming from an attorney, the Governor, a state legislator, a member of Congress, the Secretary of the department, the division administrator, the Attorney General or an assistant, a federal investigative agency, a state or federal court clerk or judge, or the President, goes to the facility's legal address, and publications, subscriptions and packages to the facility's package address, both listed per facility on the money, mail and property page: Columbia Correctional Institution, for one, takes legal mail at P.O.

Box 950, Portage, WI 53901 and packages at 2925 Columbia Drive. The department acknowledges that delivery has been slower than expected since the mail change and says it is working with the vendor.

Back to the topics

Money, packages and property

Funds come in only through Access Corrections Secure Deposit and its walk in partner CashPayToday, never directly to the facility. Online or by phone at (866) 345-1884, with bilingual agents around the clock, Visa and MasterCard are accepted for a fee; walk in sites at Dollar General, Family Dollar, Speedway and other stores take cash only after enrollment at CashPayToday or (844) 340-2274, up to a daily limit of $2,900; and the Postal Service route carries no fee, a cashier's check, personal check or money order payable to Access Secure Deposits with the department's bilingual deposit slip, the DOC number on both in blue or black ink and nothing else enclosed, to Secure Deposits, Wisconsin DOC, P.O.

Box 12486, St. Louis, MO 63132. Property comes only from approved vendor catalogs, shipped from the retailer with a receipt, never dropped off at a visit: Jack L Marcus at 1-800-236-2611 or its Milwaukee storefront at 5300 West Fond du Lac Avenue, and Union Supply's Wisconsin Package Program at (562) 361-5706. The specialty commissary package program, the former personal care package program, lets family, friends and the residents themselves buy approved items quarterly from Access Securepak, Jack L Marcus and Union Supply Group, with a $150 limit per resident, per vendor and per quarter and a $20 minimum order.

Back to the topics

Calls and messages

Persons in care place outgoing calls only; incoming calls are not allowed. ICSolutions is the contracted provider for calling and billing, reached at (877) 870-3259 on the general information page and at 888-506-8407 on the facilities page, and residents may fund their own calling accounts while family who want only to accept collect calls open a prepaid account. Electronic messages and photos go through a Getting Out account to anyone with an ICS tablet, free to open, at $0.15 a message with three free messages a week that do not carry over, after both sides accept the contact request; those still on the older ATG tablet use CorrLinks for messages only, also at $0.15, and CorrLinks messages stop once a site moves to ICS.

Every message is reviewed by staff, video visits are being moved to ICS as well, and the department advises against buying an ATG tablet since each resident is issued an ICS tablet. Court calls and virtual court appearances are scheduled through the court scheduler at the facility at least two working days ahead.

Back to the topics

Visiting: the questionnaire, the list and the door

Everyone who wants to visit must be on the inmate's approved visitor list under Administrative Code chapter 309.08, after a DOC-21AA Visitor Questionnaire that the inmate obtains and mails to each prospective visitor, minor children included, and the visitor returns to the institution; the inmate is told when a visitor is added, and a denial, on grounds set out in the code, comes in writing. A person under 18 needs the consent of a parent or guardian who is not incarcerated, documented on the form, and visits only with an adult on the list unless married to the inmate.

During intake at Dodge, the Milwaukee Secure Detention Facility or Taycheedah an inmate may have up to four adult visitors who are close family, parents including step and foster, spouse, children, grandparents, grandchildren and siblings, with minor children not counted, and those with sex offenses may be barred from visitors under 18; after intake the list holds up to twelve adults, minors not counted until they turn 18, with more allowed by the warden if every name is close family, and only the inmate changes the list.

Each facility posts its own hours, visits per week and visitors per visit. On the grounds no one communicates with inmates from outside the visiting area, waves or honks, no one loiters in the lot or waits in a car, vehicles are locked with windows up or the visit is terminated, and a vehicle left more than 24 hours may be towed. A visitor arrives no more than 15 minutes before the hours begin, may fill out a DOC-176 Request to Visit Offender, may have a hand stamped, and at 16 or older shows a valid state driver's license, passport or visa, DMV photo ID, military ID or tribal photo ID, with other proof arranged in advance when religion forbids a photograph; nothing, food, money, gifts or documents, is brought in for a resident, pockets are turned out, and the metal detector must be cleared within three attempts, with a DOC-2424 form for anyone whose medical device sets it off.

Back to the topics

Reading a Wisconsin result

A locator record means a sentence to the department, in a facility or on supervision, and carries the DOC number; the department says the record may lag the truth, and someone missing from it belongs to a county jail. Maryland takes the letters, St. Louis or Access Corrections takes the money, ICSolutions carries the calls and messages, and the questionnaire the inmate mails out decides who may visit.

Back to the topics

Questions about finding an inmate in Wisconsin

Back to the topics

Related Wisconsin records

The locator is one of the Wisconsin records this site covers: the Wisconsin arrest records guide explains what a booking makes public, the court records guide covers Wisconsin Circuit Court Access, the sex offender registry guide covers the department's registry, and the Wisconsin county pages list each sheriff and jail.