Sheriff Denita Ball Tries To Set Record Straight on Jail Tablets

County Executive David Crowley, Sheriff Denita Ball and U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany.

Following U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany‘s attacks on Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, Sheriff Denita Ball has found herself in a position of having to defend a program providing digital tablets to inmates in the Milwaukee County Jail.

The Tiffany campaign seized on the issue of jail tablets to attack Crowley after Judge David Borowski questioned why the jail provides them during a court hearing in a high-profile triple-murder case. The defendant in the case, Thomas Zollicoffer, allegedly used a tablet to discuss threatening witnesses.

But it’s Ball who is responsible for overseeing the tablet program in the jail. Now she’s having to defend the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) and the tablet program after the Tiffany campaign made it a major angle of attack in the race for governor.

“Our office has an obligation to run the Milwaukee County Jail safely, securely and in a way that holds people accountable when they break the rules,” Ball said in a statement Thursday. “We also have an obligation to make sure the public has accurate information. Misrepresenting how this technology works — or who pays for it — doesn’t make anyone safer. It just spreads misinformation.”

Approximately 20,000 people cycle in and out of custody at the jail every year.

The MCSO provides tablets to all inmates unless a court commissioner or a judge orders that they do not receive one. Inmates can use them to contact defense attorneys or friends and family outside the jail. The tablets come loaded with free educational programs and entertainment options that must be paid for.

Tiffany visited the Milwaukee Police Association offices earlier this week to criticize Crowley as soft on crime, with a particular emphasis on the issue of jail tablets.

Tiffany cited incidents where tablets were misused, and charged that Crowley has not done enough to respond to the problems. The congressman and his campaign have also said the tablets were used to access “child pornography.” A spokesperson for Ball told Urban Milwaukee that is impossible because the tablets are not directly connected to the internet.

Now Ball is attempting to clear the air and misinformation circulating about the jail’s use of tablets.

In her statement, the sheriff explained that the tablets are provided by the jail’s communications contractor, ICSolutions; that they are not paid for by taxpayers; that the tablets are connected to a closed, provider-managed network, not the internet; that inmates can’t contact just anyone, as recipients receive a notification to create an account and accept a message when one is sent; that it’s not possible for the MCSO to monitor every message in real time, but it does revoke access when tablets are misused; and that the use of tablets in corrections settings occurs across the state and country and is not a partisan issue.

During a public event Wednesday, reporters asked Crowley about the use of a jail tablet to contact a victim 1,500 times. “This is a situation that I take very seriously, and we’re having ongoing conversations with the sheriff’s department to figure out what the process was and actually how this actually happened,” responded the county executive.

Crowley also pointed out that the federal Bureau of Prisons recently launched a laptop program and that the state Department of Corrections implemented a similar program while former governor Scott Walker was in office and Tiffany was a member of the state Assembly.

Facing attacks from Tiffany on the issue of public safety, Crowley swung back, saying, “He’s voted to defund our police officers, and I would love for… you all to continue to ask him as to why he voted against releasing the Epstein files.”

In July 2025, Tiffany joined House Republicans in voting down a measure that would have forced the release of documents related to criminal investigations of the sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, a former close friend of President Donald Trump. Epstein committed suicide while in custody in 2019.

In November 2025, after sustained public pressure, Tiffany and other House Republicans voted to pass the Epstein Files Transparency Act, requiring the U.S. Department of Justice to release the documents.