Mexican Mafia used deputy to sneak heroin into L.A. jail, records say

Even after it was deciphered, the coded message from jail seemed strange.

In a recorded call, a Los Angeles County inmate recited a string of numbers to a woman on the other end of the line: “84, 89, 17, 17, 31 …”

Sheriff’s deputies had seized a handwritten key seized from inside the jail that allowed them to decode it. “I need you to go buy two big Pringles chips,” it began, according to law enforcement records reviewed by The Times.

The exchange from April 2024 is at the heart of an arrest by sheriff’s investigators of one of their own: Deputy Michael Meiser, assigned to a specialized unit that monitored gang activity in the nation’s largest jail complex. He is now charged with conspiring with gang “shot-callers” to smuggle heroin into lockups.

Deputies arrested Meiser on April 30, 2024. Inside a bag that Meiser allegedly brought onto jail grounds, investigators found more than a pound of heroin hidden inside two tubes of Pringles.

Within the jails, where inmates sell heroin in tiny smears called “papers,” that amount was worth $226,000, a sheriff’s lieutenant wrote in a report.

Meiser has pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiring to distribute drugs within a jail and participating in a gang conspiracy. His lawyer didn’t return a request for comment.

Other deputies assigned to Operation Safe Jails have not been implicated in the drug trafficking scheme. But a report filed by the Sheriff’s Department’s Internal Criminal Investigations Bureau portrayed a squad that accepted gang leaders wielded more authority over inmates than their jailers.

Meiser’s partner spoke of being “on the same page” with inmate “shot-callers” on such issues as overdoses and violence, which deputies felt they were powerless to prevent. Deputy Jose Munguia said in his internal affairs interview, he and Meiser asked the gang leaders to avoid killing anyone or hurting deputies when they dispensed their own brand of discipline.

Sheriff’s Department officials didn’t directly address questions about how Meiser’s unit engaged with gang leaders. “We hold our employees to the highest standards and expect them to safeguard individuals within our custody,” the department said in an unsigned, emailed statement. “When they violate the law they will be held accountable.”

Records show Meiser’s partner said their approach was intended to minimize chaos in the jail system. Meiser became friendly with inmates who wanted the deputy’s ear — but it also brought him closer to hardened criminals who used violence to keep drug and extortion rackets running smoothly.

By the time of his partner’s arrest, Munguia said, “We would walk through a building and all you would hear is, ‘Meiser. Meiser. Meiser. Meiser.’ All the inmates are like just trying to talk to him. They’re all yelling his name from the bars.”

Meiser, 39, was assigned to North County Correctional Facility, one of eight county jails that together hold more than 12,000 inmates.

About half of those prisoners are Latino, and Munguia told internal investigators the Mexican Mafia dictates their lives behind bars. A prison-based syndicate of about 140 senior Latino gang members, the Mexican Mafia designates inmates to oversee drug and extortion schemes in specific jails or modules.

It was Meiser and Munguia’s job to investigate these “shot-callers” by listening to their phone calls, monitoring surveillance cameras within the jail and interviewing informants, Munguia told internal investigators.

The “shot-caller” at North County Correctional Facility was Jose Rodriguez, a reputed member of the Pacoima Project Boys gang called “Benji,” Munguia said.

Rodriguez, 47, issued inmates “driver’s licenses” — handwritten notes giving them permission to sell drugs — and imposed discipline in the form of beatings, the deputy said.

“If they had to do any smash-outs, any narcotics, everything went through him,” Munguia said.

Inmates and their jailers might be expected to be sworn enemies, but Munguia described taking a less-than-adversarial approach to Rodriguez.

“Let’s say there’s a riot, Hispanics versus Black inmates in the dorm,” Munguia explained to internal investigators. “Of course we would — we would go to him and ask him to make sure, like, it’s not going to continue.”

Rodriguez often sent his right-hand man, Jackie Triplett, to speak on his behalf, according to Munguia. Triplett, 40, and Meiser had a “rapport” because they had mutual friends in the Antelope Valley, Munguia said.

The main issues they discussed were keeping overdoses and racial tensions to a minimum, Munguia said. The gang leaders appear to have taken the talks seriously. According to the internal affairs report, deputies seized a list of “rules and expectations” from Rodriguez’s bunk that was addressed to Latino inmates.

Fentanyl, a powerful opioid that has driven a surge in fatal overdoses, was prohibited. So was “disrespecting” jail staff and buying drugs from inmates of other races.

“ANYONE THAT CHOOSES TO GO AGAINST THIS IS TO BE DEALT WITH ACCORDINGLY,” the message warned.

Another note seized from Rodriguez’s living area listed the discipline meted out for the week. Infractions ranged from using fentanyl to “gossiping” to failing to repay a debt. Violators were punished with beatings — the least severe lasting 13 seconds, the harshest a “smash-out” that so badly injured an inmate deputies were required to remove him from the jail module.

Munguia told internal investigators he and Meiser did not believe they could prevent gang leaders from ordering violence. Instead, they reasoned with Rodriguez and Triplett to “mitigate” it, he said.

“If you’re going to assault someone, we don’t want any deputies hurt,” he recalled telling them. “We don’t want — obviously, we don’t want the inmates to die. So let’s try to do it as minimal as possible and pretty much not cause too much attention.”

The internal investigator sounded puzzled.

“It would seem to me like that practice would almost empower the inmates,” he said. “You’re kind of acknowledging their authority by doing that? Is that correct?”

Munguia said he didn’t agree with the approach, which he claimed he learned from Meiser, but “the way I was taught was, like, it had to be done.”

Starting in February 2024, investigators from an FBI task force noticed a series of strange phone calls made by Triplett and Rodriguez, according to the internal affairs report.

Triplett spoke to a woman who said she’d bought “white Jordans” and “black Jordans” — coded language for methamphetamine and heroin, investigators suspected.

The next day, Meiser was shown on the jail’s surveillance cameras handing Triplett a bag and bedroll, the report says. Later that night, Triplett called to thank the woman, who said it was his “time to shine,” according to the report.

Men’s Central Jail.

(Al Seib/ Los Angeles Times)

Two months later, an inmate in Rodriguez’s module read off the string of numbers that were later decoded to be a request for Pringles.

“Whatever girlfriend give you put half in one half in the other,” the rest of the message said, according to the internal affairs report. “Put a few chips on top and sual it like its brand new.”

Rodriguez was recorded on a jail call asking his sister to send a “1 o’clock” and a “5 o’clock” — code for $1,000 and $5,000, investigators believed — to the CashApp account of Meiser’s brother-in-law, the report says.

The day after the call, internal affairs detectives got a warrant to place a tracking device on Meiser’s white 2018 BMW 530i.

Meiser appeared to his partner to be living beyond the means of a sheriff’s deputy. Along with the BMW, Munguia said, Meiser drove an Infiniti and was building a custom Ford truck.

“He just said everything was on credit,” Munguia told internal investigators.

The morning of April 30, 2024, internal affairs detectives tailed Meiser from his home in Lancaster to a gas station in Valencia, the report says. He parked next to a red SUV. Someone in the driver’s seat handed him a bag, according to the report.

Meiser drove to Munguia’s apartment and the two carpooled to the jail in Mungia’s truck. In the parking lot, Meiser unlocked a police car and put something in the trunk before entering the jail, the report says.

Detectives searched the police car. Inside a Sprouts grocery bag were two tubes of Pringles. Stuffed down beneath the chips were plastic-wrapped blocks of black tar heroin — 1.128 pounds, the report says.

Meiser, apparently unaware of the search, asked a colleague to drive the police car into the jail’s secured area, according to the report. “Just wanted the radio car brought around if you were coming because I’m lazy. Lol,” he wrote in a text message cited in the report.

Munguia told internal investigators it was unlike Meiser to ask a favor of the deputy, whom Meiser “hated.” The deputy told Meiser he wasn’t at the jail and couldn’t do it.

After their shift, Munguia and Meiser were leaving the jail grounds in Munguia’s truck when a police car stopped them. Munguia recalled thinking it was a training exercise or a joke. Then sheriff’s deputies ordered them out at gunpoint.

“Oh s—,” Meiser said, according to Munguia. “Are they being f—ing serious?”

In Meiser’s bag, internal affairs detectives found two envelopes containing $15,000, according to the report. Detectives seized another $10,500 from his sock drawer after serving a warrant at his house.

Meiser refused to speak with investigators.

In his internal affairs interview, Munguia said there were signs in hindsight that Meiser had grown too close to the men he was supposed to be investigating.

“How vocal he was with inmates. Their rapport — well, what we thought was rapport,” Munguia said. “Obviously, [it] was more than that.”