Reviewed and updated October 9, 2026 by the SearchSystems.net editorial team. The arrest counts are the ones each agency reported to the FBI, as the FBI held them on October 8, 2026. The jail figures are from the Vera Institute of Justice's Incarceration Trends data. Every office link was opened and checked against the office's own site on September 23, 2026.
Kankakee County, Illinois, has about 106,000 residents (2024 Census Bureau estimate), and arrests there are reported to the FBI by the Kankakee County Sheriff's Office, nine city agencies and one campus agency. An arrest leaves the same records whoever makes it: the arresting agency's report, the record of anyone held at the county jail, and, if the State's Attorney files charges, a case in the Circuit Court of Kankakee County. This guide says who keeps each one, what it costs and who may see it, with the arrest counts each agency reported.
This guide covers who makes arrests, how many arrests, booking and the jail, finding an arrest, copies, cities and common questions.
Related guides: Kankakee County public records, Illinois arrest records, Illinois inmate search and Illinois criminal records.
Who Makes Arrests in Kankakee County
The Kankakee County Sheriff's Office is the county agency that reports arrests to the FBI for Kankakee County. It reported 157 arrests for 2025.
Arrests inside nine of the county's cities are reported to the FBI by an agency of the city's own, listed here with the Census population and what each reported:
- Kankakee, 23,535 residents: 0 arrests reported for 2020.
- Bourbonnais, 18,083 residents: 159 arrests reported for 2025.
- Bradley, 15,298 residents: 402 arrests reported for 2025.
- Manteno, 9,241 residents: 107 arrests reported for 2025.
- Momence, 3,169 residents: 0 arrests reported for 2025.
- Herscher, 1,493 residents: 0 arrests reported for 2019.
- Grant Park, 1,282 residents: 1 arrests reported for 2024.
- St. Anne, 1,130 residents: 16 arrests reported for 2025.
- Essex, 853 residents: 0 arrests reported for 2019.
A city on that list is reported separately whether the officers are the city's own or the sheriff's under contract; the FBI's list does not say which.
The FBI's agency list also places one more agency in Kankakee County: Kankakee Community College (campus police).
How Many Arrests Each Agency Reports in Kankakee County
Each agency reports its arrests to the FBI by month, and the FBI publishes them on the Crime Data Explorer. These are the full-year totals, all offenses, as the FBI held them on October 8, 2026; a year with months missing or not reported is left out.
- Bradley: 402 for 2025, 399 for 2024 and 377 for 2023.
- Bourbonnais: 159 for 2025, 184 for 2024 and 164 for 2023.
- Kankakee County Sheriff's Office: 157 for 2025, 177 for 2024 and 188 for 2023.
- Manteno: 107 for 2025, 87 for 2024 and 87 for 2023.
- St. Anne: 16 for 2025, 20 for 2024, 19 for 2023 and 9 for 2022.
- Momence: 0 for 2025, 0 for 2024, 1 for 2023, 0 for 2020 and 0 for 2019; 2021 and 2022 are missing months.
- Grant Park: 1 for 2024, 0 for 2020 and 0 for 2019; 2021, 2022 and 2023 are missing months.
- Kankakee: 0 for 2020 and 0 for 2019.
- Essex: 0 for 2019.
- Herscher: 0 for 2019.
Together, the six agencies with all twelve months of 2025 on file reported 841 arrests that year. The same agencies with both 2025 and 2024 complete reported 841 in 2025 against 867 in 2024, down 3 percent.
Through July 2026, the five agencies with every month so far on file reported 493 arrests, against 506 in the same months of 2025.
Grant Park reported only part of 2025 (5 months) and is left out of the totals.
Booking: Where People Arrested in Kankakee County Are Held
The county jail is where a person arrested in Kankakee County and kept in custody ends up, whichever agency made the arrest, though a city department may hold someone in its own cells first and a person cited and released at the scene is never booked. The jail's record of each person held, with the charges, is a public record of the arrest, and once the person is released or sentenced the record continues in the court file.
On an average day in 2023 the jail held about 620 people, up from about 600 in 2019. Its rated capacity in 2023 was 700 beds, and it ran at 88 percent of it that year. The figures are from the Vera Institute of Justice's Incarceration Trends data.
SearchSystems opened and checked the custody page of the Kankakee County Sheriff's Office at kankakeecountysheriff.com/inmate-search (page title: Inmate Search | Kankakee County Sheriff's Office), which answered when SearchSystems opened it on September 23, 2026.
That page is the place to look for someone who was booked recently; a person cited and released at the scene, or held only a few hours by a city department, will not be on it.
A person sentenced to prison serves the sentence in a facility of the Illinois Department of Corrections, whose inmate locator is at idoc.illinois.gov/offender/inmatesearch.html.
How to Find Out About an Arrest in Kankakee County
Whether someone was arrested in Kankakee County, and what came of it, shows up in three places: the custody page of the Kankakee County Sheriff's Office described above, for anyone booked into the county jail; the case index of the Circuit Court of Kankakee County, kept by the Circuit Clerk, which shows whether charges were filed and the next court date; the State's Attorney, which decides whether an arrest becomes a charge (its page is at k3county.net/m/directory/department?did=41, phone 815-936-5801).
The court records page SearchSystems verified for the county, at illinoiscourts.gov/courts-directory/24/Kankakee-County-Courthouse-/... (page title: Kankakee County Courthouse | State of Illinois Office of the Illinois Courts), phone (815) 937-2915, belongs to a lower court, not to the Circuit Court of Kankakee County.
Illinois is one of the states that lets anyone look up another person's statewide criminal history: conviction information is public under the Uniform Conviction Information Act, through the Illinois State Police. That record shows what agencies reported to the state, which is wider than one county's court index but can lag it.
Getting a Copy of an Arrest Record in Kankakee County
The report of an arrest is released by the agency that made it; the jail and the court hold their own records of the same event, but not the report. Under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act the agency must answer within 5 business days, with one 5-day extension, and it may charge copying only after the first 50 pages.
- An arrest by the Kankakee County Sheriff's Office: ask its records unit.
- An arrest in Kankakee, Bourbonnais, Bradley, Manteno, Momence, Herscher or another of the cities listed above: the records unit of the agency that reports for that city; the city guides linked above name each city's records office.
- An arrest by Kankakee Community College: the records office of the agency involved.
- A defendant who has been charged gets the report through the case: the State's Attorney, 815-936-5801, handles discovery for pending cases.
- The court file of a case that was filed: in the Circuit Court of Kankakee County it is kept by the Circuit Clerk. The court records page SearchSystems verified for the county, at illinoiscourts.gov, phone (815) 937-2915, is a lower court's.
- Your own statewide record: a name-based or fingerprint-based request to the Illinois State Police.
Cities in Kankakee County: Who Reports the Arrests
The FBI lists a separate arrest reporting agency for nine of the 19 cities in Kankakee County: Kankakee, Bourbonnais, Bradley, Manteno, Momence, Herscher, Grant Park, St. Anne and Essex. Limestone, Aroma Park, Hopkins Park, Sun River Terrace, Bonfield, Buckingham, Sammons Point, Reddick, Irwin and Union Hill have no separate reporting agency in the FBI's list.
Wherever in the county the arrest happens, a person kept in custody goes to the county jail and the case goes to the Circuit Court of Kankakee County.
SearchSystems has a guide to the offices of these cities in Kankakee County, with the 2024 Census Bureau population; a city with its own arrest records guide opens there:
- Bourbonnais (18,083)
- Bradley (15,298)
- Manteno (9,241)
Frequently Asked Questions
How many arrests are made in Kankakee County each year?
Bradley reported 402 arrests to the FBI for 2025, and the six agencies with every month of 2025 on file reported 841 between them.
How do I find out if someone is in jail in Kankakee County?
Look on the custody page of the Kankakee County Sheriff's Office at kankakeecountysheriff.com/inmate-search. It covers people booked into the county jail.
Where are people arrested in Kankakee County booked?
Those kept in custody go to the county jail, run by the Kankakee County Sheriff's Office; a person cited and released at the scene is not booked.
Are arrest records public in Kankakee County?
The court files of criminal cases are public, and so is the statewide criminal history kept by the Illinois State Police: conviction information is public under the Uniform Conviction Information Act. The arrest report itself is released by the agency that made the arrest, under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act.
How do I get a copy of an arrest report in Kankakee County?
From the agency that made the arrest: the Kankakee County Sheriff's Office for its own arrests, or the agency that reports for the city where it happened. Under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act the answer is due within 5 business days, with one 5-day extension.
Is this the official Kankakee County website?
No. SearchSystems.net is an independent public records guide, online since 1997. It links to the official county, court and state offices described above and does not hold records, charge for them or take requests.