LOS ANGELES — A former Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy was sentenced Thursday to 67 months in federal prison after admitting he tried to smuggle more than a pound of heroin hidden in two Pringles cans into a county jail.
U.S. District Judge Fernando M. Olguin sentenced Michael Meiser, 40, of Lancaster. Meiser pleaded guilty July 10, 2025, to one count of possession with intent to distribute heroin.
Meiser worked at the North County Correctional Facility in Castaic when he agreed to smuggle drugs for inmates in exchange for cash and payments through Cash App, according to his plea agreement. On April 24, 2024, a person linked to an inmate sent $1,500 to one of Meiser’s relatives, who told him about the payment.
Six days later, a woman at a gas station in Valencia handed Meiser a grocery bag containing two Pringles cans filled with about 1.1 pounds of heroin and envelopes holding $15,000 in cash, prosecutors said.
Meiser rode with another deputy past the jail’s first security checkpoint. In the parking lot, he hid the cans under computer towers in the trunk of a sheriff’s patrol car, prosecutors said.
Sheriff’s investigators arrested Meiser as he was leaving the jail later that day. They recovered the heroin from the patrol car and found the cash, a loaded handgun, Meiser’s badge and his department ID in a backpack in the other deputy’s truck.
The FBI investigated with assistance from the Sheriff’s Department’s Internal Criminal Investigations Bureau.
Quick fact checklist
- Defendant — Michael Meiser, 40, of Lancaster, California.
- Federal conviction — One count of possession with intent to distribute heroin. He pleaded guilty July 10, 2025.
- Sentence — 67 months in federal prison, imposed Nov. 5, 2026, by U.S. District Judge Fernando M. Olguin.
- Drug seizure — About 511 grams, or 1.1 pounds, of heroin in two Pringles cans recovered from a patrol car at the North County Correctional Facility in Castaic.
- Payments — A relative received $1,500 through Cash App on April 24, 2024. Meiser received $15,000 in cash on April 30, the day investigators arrested him.