UPDATE: Report: Water leaking into evidence room

MONROE — Water is leaking into the evidence room of the Walton County Sheriff’s Office, The Walton Tribune reported.

“It has done this from day one,” The Walton Tribune quoted Sheriff Joe Chapman as saying.

County officials, according to the newspaper report, are blaming the leak on a construction company that worked on the jail; the evidence room is located beneath the jail. As it stands now, taxpayers could be on the hook for the repairs, and inmates in the county jail may have to be housed elsewhere while the reports are made, the report indicates.

“This project should have never been finalized,” the newspaper quoted Chapman as saying. “I was supposed to give final approval and never would have paid them. But someone in the finance office went and paid them, so they never came back.”

The Walton County Jail on average houses 335 inmates, according to the sheriff’s office website. To alleviate the leaks, officials have tried a number of stopgap measures.