Offenders arrested within city limits are booked and processed at Virginia Beach Sheriff’s Correctional Center located at 2501 James Madison Blvd, Virginia Beach VA. The building is heavily secured as it is shared with the armed officers of the Virginia Beach Police Department. It is a short term facility with limited space, inmates are held in a single-person cell.
Intake handles arrestees that include their booking and fingerprinting. Inmates will remain in jail until their court arraignment where they will learn their fate by a magistrate. If bail is posted, or the arrestee is bonded out or released on their own recognizance the offender is released. If bail is denied, they will be transported by the sheriff for a longer stay at the Princess Anne County Jail.
The concept of a city jail that is wholly independent of any county structure is rare in the U.S. and is primarily a Virginia phenomenon. Of the 41 independent cities in the United States, 38 are in Virginia. The three outside Virginia are Baltimore, Maryland; St. Louis, Missouri; and Carson City, Nevada. These are cities not part of any county, so their detention is inherently city-operated with no county jail to fall back on.