East Carroll Detention Center re-opens - KNOE 8 News; KNOE-TV; KNOE.com |

LAKE PROVIDENCE, La. (KNOE 8 News) -  The East Carroll Parish Detention Center is back in business, after standing empty for a while. In 2011, outgoing Sheriff Mark Shumate sold Riverbend Detention Center to a private company and closed the East Carroll Parish Detention Center.

All prisoners at that time were moved to the Riverbend Detention Center just down the road, taking those funds away from the sheriffs department. But during the summer of 2012, new Sheriff Wydette Williams, filed a lawsuit to get the center back and in September regained control.

Williams says getting Riverbend back and re-opening of the East Carroll Detention Center will benefit the people of the parish in several ways. "It offers jobs, it offers insurance, as well as benefits through the job," said Williams. Some of the Riverbend prison population has been transferred to the East Carroll Center. 

Williams says under the sheriffs control, safety will be a high priority at the centers. "By being run by the Sheriff, we're going to have a more hands on approach, to any situation that happens, with the facility or anything surrounding the facility."

The agreement to regain control over the centers was accelerated after the state removed more than 350 inmates from Riverbend in August, following a shakedown where contraband was found.