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.
Obion County, Tennessee, has about 30,000 residents (2024 Census Bureau estimate), and arrests there are reported to the FBI by the Obion County Sheriff's Office, five city agencies and one other 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 District Attorney General files charges, a case in the Obion County Circuit and Chancery Courts. 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: Obion County public records, Tennessee arrest records, Tennessee inmate search and Tennessee criminal records.
Who Makes Arrests in Obion County
The Obion County Sheriff's Office is the county agency that reports arrests to the FBI for Obion County. It reported 513 arrests for 2025.
The FBI lists five cities in Obion County with a reporting agency of their own, with the Census population and what each reported:
- Union City, 10,876 residents: 841 arrests reported for 2025.
- South Fulton, 2,177 residents: 86 arrests reported for 2025.
- Troy, 1,407 residents: 30 arrests reported for 2020.
- Obion, 968 residents: 40 arrests reported for 2021.
- Hornbeak, 505 residents: 3 arrests reported for 2020.
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 Trimble Police Department and the Kenton Police Department are each listed by the FBI across several counties including Obion County, so their arrests are not broken out for Obion County here.
The FBI's agency list also places one more agency in Obion County: Drug Task Force's 27th Judicial District (other).
How Many Arrests Each Agency Reports in Obion 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.
- Union City: 841 for 2025, 1,018 for 2024, 1,189 for 2023, 1,000 for 2022, 877 for 2021 and 775 for 2020.
- Obion County Sheriff's Office: 513 for 2025, 568 for 2024, 540 for 2023, 557 for 2022, 454 for 2021 and 437 for 2020.
- South Fulton: 86 for 2025, 53 for 2022, 127 for 2020 and 171 for 2019; 2021, 2023 and 2024 are missing months.
- Obion: 40 for 2021, 12 for 2020 and 18 for 2019.
- Troy: 30 for 2020 and 35 for 2019.
- Hornbeak: 3 for 2020 and 0 for 2019.
Together, the three agencies with all twelve months of 2025 on file reported 1,440 arrests that year. The two of them with both 2025 and 2024 complete reported 1,354 in 2025 against 1,586 in 2024, down 15 percent.
Through August 2026, the three agencies with every month so far on file reported 1,035 arrests, against 976 in the same months of 2025.
Hornbeak and Obion reported only part of 2025 (3 months and 8 months) and are left out of the totals.
Booking: Where People Arrested in Obion County Are Held
The county jail is where a person arrested in Obion 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 2024 the jail held about 150 people, down from about 150 in 2019. Its rated capacity in 2024 was 159 beds, and it ran at 95 percent of it that year. The figures are from the Vera Institute of Justice's Incarceration Trends data.
SearchSystems opened and checked the jail page of the Obion County Sheriff's Office at obioncountysheriff.com (page title: OBION COUNTY SHERIFF), which answered when SearchSystems opened it on September 23, 2026.
A person sentenced to prison serves the sentence in a facility of the Tennessee Department of Correction, whose inmate locator is at foil.app.tn.gov/foil/search.jsp.
How to Find Out About an Arrest in Obion County
Whether someone was arrested in Obion County, and what came of it, shows up in two places: the case index of the Obion County Circuit and Chancery Courts, which shows whether charges were filed and the next court date (the court records page SearchSystems verified is at obioncountytn.gov/courts.html, phone (731) 507-0999); the District Attorney General, which decides whether an arrest becomes a charge (its page is at tennesseeda.gov/district-27).
Tennessee is one of the states that lets anyone look up another person's statewide criminal history: TORIS lets anyone run a name-based criminal history search online, for $29 a search, through the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. 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 Obion 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 Tennessee Public Records Act the agency must answer within 7 business days, and it may charge copying, and labor after the first hour.
- An arrest by the Obion County Sheriff's Office: ask its records unit.
- An arrest in Union City, South Fulton, Troy, Obion or Hornbeak: the records unit of the agency that reports for that city.
- An arrest by Drug Task Force's 27th Judicial District: the records office of the agency involved.
- A defendant who has been charged gets the report through the case: the District Attorney General handles discovery for pending cases.
- The court file of a case that was filed: the Obion County Circuit and Chancery Courts, through the court records page at obioncountytn.gov/courts.html, phone (731) 507-0999.
- Your own statewide record: the same request described above, for your own name.
Cities in Obion County: Who Reports the Arrests
The FBI lists a separate arrest reporting agency for five of the eight cities in Obion County: Union City, South Fulton, Troy, Obion and Hornbeak. Woodland Mills, Rives and Samburg 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 Obion County Circuit and Chancery Courts.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many arrests are made in Obion County each year?
Union City reported 841 arrests to the FBI for 2025, and the three agencies with every month of 2025 on file reported 1,440 between them.
How do I find out if someone is in jail in Obion County?
Ask the Obion County Sheriff's Office; its jail page SearchSystems verified is at obioncountysheriff.com.
Where are people arrested in Obion County booked?
Those kept in custody go to the county jail, run by the Obion County Sheriff's Office; a person cited and released at the scene is not booked.
Are arrest records public in Obion County?
The court files of criminal cases are public, and so is the statewide criminal history kept by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation: TORIS lets anyone run a name-based criminal history search online, for $29. The arrest report itself is released by the agency that made the arrest, under the Tennessee Public Records Act.
How do I get a copy of an arrest report in Obion County?
From the agency that made the arrest: the Obion County Sheriff's Office for its own arrests, or the agency that reports for the city where it happened. Under the Tennessee Public Records Act the answer is due within 7 business days.
Is this the official Obion 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.