By C1 Staff
ROCKINGHAM, N.C. — The Richmond County Jail is adding two technological upgrades – an automated detainee hotline and an ATM.
The hotline will list charges, bond amounts, visitation days and times and instructions for sending mail when callers enter a current detainee’s name, according to Your Daily Journal.
The ATM will allow family members to deposit money in a detainee’s account for canteen purchases. Though marked “Jail ATM,” Sheriff James E. Clemmons stresses that it’s only for adding money to inmate’s accounts.
The machine will keep a record of deposits to prevent someone accusing a jailer of pocketing money earmarked for an inmate.
Both systems were part of a 2010 campaign promise to bring technological upgrades to the jail. Neither required any expenditure of taxpayer money from the sheriff’s office.
More updates, such as commissary services that allow inmates to order clothing, are expected in the future.