Milwaukee County taxpayers are shelling out more than $1 million a year so inmates held in the county jail and Community Reintegration Center can make free phone and video calls and use tablets supplied by ICSolutions, The Heartland Post has learned exclusively.
Budgets signed by Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, now the Democratic candidate for governor, have authorized $975,000 per year for a dedicated communications line that provides inmates with 390 minutes of free phone calls and 60 free video visitation minutes per month. Taxpayers are also funding $100,000 per year in technical support fees to ICSolutions (formerly known as Inmate Calling Solutions), the contracted vendor that provides tablet services to inmates.
The program is highly controversial, as several inmates have used ICSolutions tablets to bombard their victims with messages and even plan violent assaults on potential witnesses to their crimes. Last month, Milwaukee County Judge David Borowski blasted the program after discovering that Thomas Zollicoffer, who is charged in a triple murder, used his jail-issued tablet to discuss threatening witnesses.
“Why was the Sheriff’s Department giving laptops and iPads to defendants who are charged in homicides, or any defendants?” Judge Borowski seethed from the bench. “It’s preposterous, and I would like the Sheriff to answer that. There is no need, constitutional or otherwise, to have a tablet when they sit in jail.
“And I don’t care if they’re charged with a burglary or an armed robbery or for that matter a domestic violence case. This is a triple homicide. This defendant does not need a laptop. He will not have one again, subject to my court order.”
Now, The Heartland Post can report exclusively, taxpayers paying an exorbitant sum for inmates like Zollicoffer to use those devices.
According to the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Department’s 2024 adopted budget, “Phone Revenue has been reduced entirely to offer free phone calls to inmates within the County Jail. As a result, tax levy expenditures have increased by $975,000. This change is estimated to provide residents with 390 minutes of free phone calls per month and 60 free video visitation minutes per month.”
A year earlier, the 2023 adopted budget cut inmate phone-charge revenue by $125,000 “to support a reduction of phone charges to residents,” and transferred those costs to taxpayers. The budget provided an explanation for this change.
“The provision of accessible and low-cost phone and video visitation services to persons in custody is a prime goal of MCSO, in order to facilitate lawful communication between persons in custody and family and friends,” The Sheriff’s Department explained. “In 2022 the RFP for Communication Services was complete and ICSolutions was awarded the contract. ICSolutions will in addition to phone and video visitation services also provide tablets to persons in custody at the MCJ, which will further maximize engagement between persons in custody and the broader community.”
Those costs have steadily increased in each subsequent budget. In the 2025 adopted sheriff’s budget, “Other Services Fees charges increase by $100,000. This reimbursement is for the ICSolutions position that supports the resident communication system.”
Together, the lost phone commissions, the $975,000 communications line and the $100,000 vendor reimbursement put the annual public cost more than $1 million. That figure does not include a separate Community Reintegration Center mail-scanning amendment with ICSolutions that county fiscal notes peg at about $71,280 a year.
The Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office says the tablets themselves are generic devices on a closed network, cannot browse the open internet, and cannot place phone or video calls. A spokesperson said the Sheriff’s Office is “reviewing and actively pursuing technology to better analyze outgoing messages.”
The Sheriff’s Office has maintained that inmates are unable to message outside recipients unless those recipients create a verified account and accept contact, but several high-profile incidents of abuse of the system prove this to be untrue.
In May, prosecutors told a judge that Amier Jones, who was being held on domestic-violence and related charges, made more than 1,500 attempted calls to the victim after his arrest and that more than 300 were answered.
Assistant District Attorney Jessica Behling also cited tablet messages, including one prosecutors said read in part that a detective was “already on my hit list.” Jail staff later restricted his communications.
This month, Damian Cosme-Torres, already jailed on domestic-abuse charges, was charged with felony intimidation of a victim. Prosecutors say he made 2,439 calls to the alleged victim and sent threatening tablet messages, including one that read in part, “IF I GET OUT I SWEAR TO GET MY REVENGE, A LIFE FOR A LIFE.”
According to jail records, he also used other inmates’ PIN numbers. Most of the contacts originated at the Community Reintegration Center, which uses the same vendor system.
Earlier this month, U.S. House Oversight Committee wrote County Executive David Crowley and Sheriff Denita Ball in September seeking records on the tablet program, citing the Zollicoffer allegations and informing them that Congress did not authorize justice grants “to give inmates the means to intimidate witnesses.”
The letter indicated that the sheriff’s office received at least 960 tablets and the reintegration center at least 1,232 since 2022. The ICSolutions contract, approved by the County Board and signed by Crowley in 2022, was extended through March 2028.
Crowley’s office has said tablets were introduced so people in custody could reach family, legal help and support services and promised to work to improve the program.
“The county executive will be reaching out to the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office to identify any vulnerabilities in these safeguards and put solutions in place, so this technology can continue serving its intended purpose: supporting rehabilitation and helping individuals in County custody successfully reenter their communities with a strong support system,” a spokesperson for Crowley said.
Wisconsin’s state prison system also uses ICSolutions tablets. Those devices are issued free, but inmates generally pay for calls, messages and apps, and the state has collected commissions. Milwaukee County took the opposite path: it eliminated the commission stream and replaced it with tax levy so calls would be free.
The 2024 budget change alone, 390 free phone minutes a month, means that each inmate now receives 6½ hours of taxpayer-funded calling per month, plus an hour of free video visitation, before any paid minutes or tablet messaging.
The Office of the Milwaukee County Executive and Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office have not yet responded to The Heartland Post’s requests for comment on why taxpayers are being forced to spend so much on inmate calls and videos.
