A former Los Angeles County deputy has been sentenced to more than five years in federal prison for smuggling two Pringles cans of heroin into a Santa Clarita Valley jail, according to federal prosecutors.
U.S. District Judge Fernando M. Olgui on Thursday sentenced Michael Meiser, 40, to 67 months in federal prison.
Messer pleaded guilty last July to one count of possession with intent to distribute heroin at the North County Correctional Facility in Castaic, about 40 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles.
The prison is part of the larger prison complex at the Peter J. Pitchess Detention Center.
Federal prosecutors said Messier attempted to smuggle about 1 pound of heroin in two Pringles cans into the county jail while working for the Intelligence and Investigations Division, which monitors gang activity.
Prosecutors said that shortly after receiving the money, Messer drove his 2018 BMW 530i from his home in Lancaster to a Chevrolet gas station in Valencia, where he picked up a grocery bag from a woman who was related to an inmate.
Inside, prosecutors said, were two Pringle’s cans containing 1.1 pounds of heroin.
Sheriff’s officials said the inmates sold the heroin in small smudges called “papers,” and that the heroin inside the jar was worth about $226,000, according to federal and sheriff’s officials.
Prosecutors said the bag also contained two white envelopes containing $15,000 in cash, the remainder of Umezawa’s payment.
Messer puts the items into a green backpack and rides to work with his partner. Once inside the jail, Messer hid the cans in the trunk of a deputy’s patrol car, prosecutors said.
When Messier and another officer left the jail that day, they were stopped by peace investigators, who found cash in his backpack and retrieved a Pringles can hidden in the trunk of a sheriff’s radio truck, investigators said.
The Sheriff’s Department’s internal Criminal Investigation Bureau, which along with FBI agents investigated the scheme, filed an investigative report that described Mazer’s unit as a squad that appeared to acknowledge that gang leaders had more power over inmates than jailers.
In an internal affairs review, Mazer’s partner, Deputy Sheriff Jose Mungiu, said he was “on the same page” as inmate “callers” on issues like overdoses and violence, which deputies believed they were powerless to prevent. Mungiu said in interviews with internal affairs investigators that he and Mazer would ask gang leaders not to kill inmates or harm officers when enforcing their own discipline.
Messer’s partners say their approach is designed to minimize disruption in the prison system. He said Messer developed a rapport with many of the inmates.
It wasn’t until February 2024 that investigators learned how close Messer’s relationship was with inmates, much of it through a series of strange phone calls from the prison.
According to investigators, the calls were made by Jose Rodriguez, a known gang member and caller at the facility, and his right-hand man, Jackie Triplett.
Investigators said Triplett spoke with a woman who said she bought “white Jordans” and “black Jordans” – coded language for methamphetamine and heroin.
The next day, jail surveillance showed Messer handing Triplett a bag and bedroll, the investigative report said. Later that night, Triplett reportedly called to thank the woman, who said it was his “time to shine.”
Two months later, during a recorded call, an inmate in Rodriguez’s cell read out a sequence of numbers that was later decoded into a request for Pringles, according to investigators.
The day after the call, internal affairs detectives received a search warrant and placed a tracking device on Messer’s BMW.
Times staff writer Matthew Omseth contributed to this report.