Kentucky jail threatens to sue state corrections for unpaid medical costs of inmate
The Daviess County Detention Center is considering a lawsuit against the state Department of Corrections after the jail incurred about $300,000 in medical expenses for an inmate which officials say the state is responsible for paying.
The Daviess County Detention Center, located in Owensboro, is threatening the suit after failed attempts seeking repayment for a single inmate’s medical costs, jail officials say.
Owensboro jail officials say they sent out a state-classified inmate in their care to have treatment, and that attempts to recoup the money have been thwarted by the DOC, which they say violates legal precedent, county attorney John Burlew said in a letter to the governor.
The ordeal started in February 2022, when the jail accepted a state inmate to participate in the jail’s substance abuse program, jail officials say. In Kentucky, local jails are legally bound to house inmates awaiting adjudication after an arrest in their area. However, they also will hold state inmates while they are awaiting specific classification from the DOC to be placed in prison and serve their sentence after a conviction.
While the local jail holds the state inmate, the state will reimburse the facility for their costs, typically through a per diem rate, according to state law.
But despite a previous appellate court ruling that says the state is responsible for costs, the department so far has not complied.
Owensboro officials say the only logical next step for accountability is to pursue litigation.
Morgan Hall, the spokesperson for the department of corrections, said the agency is reviewing medical bills — which they requested June 11 of this year — to “accurately identify the expenses” that Daviess County is requesting to have reimbursed.
Owensboro jail says getting inmate treated was ‘right thing to do’
In June 2022, the inmate began to receive medical treatments that were outside the “routine scope” jails are legally bound to provide. By February 2023, the jail spent more than $69,000 on the inmate’s treatment, according to a letter sent by Burlew and obtained through Kentucky Open Records laws.
Between March and June 2023, before the inmate was moved to the Kentucky State Reformatory prison, the local jail paid an additional $222,274.99.
Daviess County Jailer Art Maglinger said the inmate received hospitalizations and treatments that could not be done at the jail, but would not specify the treatments, citing HIPAA privacy laws.
Maglinger said the decision to send the inmate for outside medical care was the “right thing to do.”
“It was necessary to start the treatment when he did,” Maglinger affirmed. “There’s nothing to look back at and say, ‘We should have done this differently.’”
Burlew first contacted Commissioner Cookie Crews about repayment in February 2025. They did not receive a response, according to a letter obtained through Kentucky Open Records laws. Another letter was sent by Burlew to the Justice and Public Safety Cabinet Commissioner Keith Jackson in April 2025. They received a letter denying the request for repayment from Leah Boggs, executive director of legal affairs.
Boggs said the treatment was not “beyond routine care,” so the state would not pay it.
Burlew called the denial “confounding,” citing a Kentucky Court of Appeals decision between the department and other local jails that affirmed the state department was on the hook for costs incurred for state inmates.
In January 2023, several local detention centers filed a lawsuit against Crews and the Department of Corrections in an effort to force the department to timely classify and transfer state inmates to prisons and adequately fund the cost of caring for state inmates housed in county jails. Jail officials wanted that to include the costs of medical, dental and psychological treatments beyond “routine care and diagnostic services,” available in local municipalities.
The department interpreted “routine care” to be every medical, dental or psychological procedure that did not require hospitalization or general anesthesia.
The circuit court, and eventually the appellate court, ruled the department’s definition was overly broad and “saddled the counties and jailers with excessive costs.”
Despite this ruling, issued shortly after Boggs’ denial letter, the department has not complied.
“While we agree the department of corrections should not be responsible for every medical bill, it is clear these treatments and expenses are beyond what anyone would call routine,” Burlew said in an August 2025 letter to Gov. Andy Beshear.
In an email sent by Allison Brown with the state’s justice department, she said the DOC did not have sufficient information to confirm “specific charges or inmate medical bills that Daviess County contends remain in dispute.”
What is routine care?
In an interview with the Lexington Herald-Leader, Maglinger said the state hasn’t been following the statute that requires them to pay for treatments outside routine care.
The core issue is how state officials and local counties define “routine.”
“Most everything that requires off-site attention falls beyond routine scope,” Maglinger asserted.
When Crews appealed the original ruling, her attorneys contended that their definition was derived from “industry experts” and it falls in line with the intent of Kentucky laws. Their definition of “routine care” is one that has been used since 2014, according to documents obtained through Kentucky Open Records.
Maglinger — and the court of appeals — disagreed.
“Through this interpretation of statutes and the implementation of its own policy, Crews and the Department of Corrections are impermissibly requiring counties to absorb costs not awarded by the legislature,” the court of appeals ruled.
Maglinger said that if no bills are being paid, the department is not recognizing anything as routine care, and more clarification could be needed through more descriptive language in Kentucky law.
“No one has really challenged them, so it’s new territory,” Maglinger said. “There is some degree of subjectivity.”
Maglinger said the case should at least be looked at because there was more than a quarter of a million dollars on the line.
“That is a big price tag for county jail’s medical treatment,” Maglinger said.
Hall said the department last heard from Daviess County officials after the previous lawsuit was concluded. She acknowledged that the department’s definition of “routine care” was invalidated, and they are in the process of creating “new regulations.”
