52 on Price County’s Sex Offender Registry: 31 Were Convicted Somewhere Else

Last updated: October 2026

TL;DR: 52 people are on Wisconsin’s sex offender registry in Price County as of Oct. 26, 2026. Thirty-one of them were convicted entirely outside this county — five in Marathon County, three in Oneida, two each in Milwaukee, Ashland, and Lincoln, and single convictions from as far as Kenosha, Brown, and Ozaukee, plus four out-of-state convictions. Only 21 have a Price County conviction on their record. Forty of the 52 are no longer under Department of Corrections supervision, meaning they live here with a registration obligation and no assigned agent. All 52 are listed as compliant with registration requirements.

What the registry actually contains

Wisconsin publishes its sex offender registry under Wis. Stat. § 301.46(5n). The Department of Corrections runs it at wistaysafe.gov, and anyone can search by name, by address within a chosen radius, or by county. No account, no fee, no request form.

We queried the county filter for Price County on Oct. 26, 2026 and aggregated the results. This article reports counts only — no names, no addresses, no photographs. The registry itself publishes all of that, and it is the correct place to look if you have a specific reason to.

The registry returned 52 records. All 52 carry a published photograph. The aggregation used the registry’s own detail records, which include a compliance status, a supervision status, a registration term, and the convicting county for each offense behind the registration.

Most registrants in Price County were convicted somewhere else

This is the finding that surprised us. Thirty-one of the 52 registrants have no Price County conviction at all. Their registering offense was prosecuted in another county or another state, and they now live here.

Two registrants carry convictions in more than one county, which is why the column sums past 52.

What this does not tell you is why anyone moved here. The registry records where a person was convicted and where they currently live; it records nothing about motive, employment, family ties, or housing availability. Anyone who tells you rural Wisconsin is absorbing registry population from Milwaukee is making an argument the data can support directionally but cannot prove. What the data does establish is the arithmetic: the majority of Price County’s registry population was prosecuted somewhere else.

Forty of 52 are not under state supervision

The registry lists a supervision status for each person. In Price County:

This is the part most residents get wrong. Being on the registry and being supervised are two different things. Registration is a lifelong or multi-decade reporting obligation that follows a conviction. Supervision is a sentence component with an end date. When supervision ends, the registration requirement usually does not.

For 40 people here, the practical consequence is that no agent is assigned to them. They report to the registry on schedule, and they are subject to the same residency and reporting statutes as anyone else on the list, but nobody is checking in on them between reports.

How long the obligations last

Thirty-six of the 52 are registered for life. Under Wis. Stat. § 301.45, a lifetime term typically attaches to a first conviction for first- or second-degree sexual assault of a child, and the obligation does not end with supervision, parole, or the passage of time.

Registration start dates in the current list run from 1990 to 2026. Nine registrants have been on the list since before 2000.

Where they live, by community

Park Falls and Phillips account for just over half the county’s registry population, which tracks their share of the county’s housing stock. The smaller towns and unincorporated addresses hold the rest.

What the offenses are

Each registration carries at least one conviction. Across the 52 registrants there are 63 convictions: 43 people have one, seven have two, and two have three.

Registrants in the current list range in age from 26 to 89, with a median of 57.

All 52 are marked compliant

Every record in the Price County result carried a compliance status of COMPLIANT on Oct. 26, 2026. That means each person had met their most recent reporting requirement as of that record’s verification date.

Worth stating plainly, because most people read a registry list backwards. A registry list is often taken to be a list of people currently out of compliance. It is not. It is a list of people required to register, most of whom are doing so.

Non-compliance is a separate matter and a serious one: knowingly failing to register under § 301.45 is a Class H felony carrying up to six years in prison and a $10,000 fine. If someone on the registry stops reporting, they leave the registry’s compliant population and become a warrant matter for law enforcement, which is a different record than the one published.

The registry is public by statute, with a stated limit

The Department of Corrections publishes this information under § 301.46(5n). It is not leaked, scraped from a private database, or obtained by request. It is posted deliberately.

The registry page carries a warning about how the information is meant to be used, and it is worth quoting rather than paraphrasing:

“It is not the intent of the Legislature that this information be used to injure, harass, or commit a criminal act against persons named in the registry, their families, or employers.”

The same page notes a second limitation: “The information contained in the registry will not reflect the entire criminal history of a particular individual.” A registry entry is a record of a registering offense, not a complete criminal record, and it is not a current risk assessment.

That is why this article reports counts and not names. A static copy of a live database is stale the week it is published, and the state updates its records continuously. The registry is the correct source for a specific person; a news article is the correct source for what the list as a whole looks like.

How to search it yourself

Go to wistaysafe.gov, read the notice, and accept the terms. Three search modes are available:

• Name search — last name, first name, middle initial.
• Geographical search, an address plus a radius, which is the mode parents and employers typically want.
• County search, a dropdown of all 72 Wisconsin counties, which is what produced the numbers in this article.

Results include a photograph, physical description, the registering offense, the convicting county and case number, the current address, and the compliance and supervision status.

The Department of Corrections also runs a community notification service by email for registrants moving into a chosen area. Registration for that is on the same site. The registry’s main line is (608) 240-5830, and the SAFE tip hotline for reporting a suspected violation is 1-877-234-0085, answered weekdays 7:45 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

What the numbers do not say

Three limits are worth being explicit about.

The counts are a snapshot. They were pulled on Oct. 26, 2026. People move, registrations end, and new ones begin. Treat any figure here as dated.

Convicting county is not where the offense happened. The registry records the county of prosecution. A person convicted in Milwaukee may have offended elsewhere, and venue can change for reasons unrelated to the facts.

Aggregate counts say nothing about any individual on the list. A person’s entry reflects one conviction at one point in time. It is not a prediction, and the registry says so itself.

Frequently asked questions

How many registered sex offenders live in Price County?

52, as of Oct. 26, 2026, according to the Wisconsin Department of Corrections registry.

Are any of them non-compliant?

None of the 52 carried a non-compliant status on that date. All were listed as COMPLIANT, meaning each had met their most recent reporting requirement.

How many are under active supervision?

Eleven are on Department of Corrections supervision and one is under DHS supervision. The remaining 40 are off supervision but still required to register.

Do most of them have Price County convictions?

No. Twenty-one have a Price County conviction. Thirty-one were convicted entirely elsewhere, including four out-of-state convictions.

Can I see the names and addresses?

Yes, on the state registry at wistaysafe.gov. Search by county for Price, or by address and radius. This article deliberately does not reproduce them.

Does being on the registry mean someone is currently dangerous?

The registry does not make that assessment and neither does this article. It lists people with a registering conviction and a reporting obligation. Risk assessment is a separate question the registry explicitly does not answer.

See also: our guide to free camping in Wisconsin

See also: what makes Price County communities special

See also: our guide to every town in Price County

Sources

Wisconsin Department of Corrections Sex Offender Registry, wistaysafe.gov, queried Oct. 26, 2026 via the county filter for Price County (52 records, all 52 detail records aggregated). Wis. Stat. § 301.45 (sex offender registration) and § 301.46 (access to registration information, including § 301.46(5n) for the public website). Registry notice text on intended use, quoted above, read from the registry site Oct. 26, 2026. Registration and compliance definitions as published by the Department of Corrections. All figures are aggregate counts; no individual records were retained or published in producing this article.