A federal judge sentenced a former Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) deputy, 40-year-old Michael Meiser,  to 67 months in federal prison for trying to smuggle one pound of heroin (hidden inside Pringles potato chip cans) into the LA County Wayside jail 

In April 2024, Meiser worked as a LASD deputy at the North County Correctional Facility in Wayside. He had agreed with inmates to smuggle narcotics into the jail in exchange for cash and payments via the Cash App digital wallet that inmates would arrange for Meiser and one of his relatives to receive. On April 24, 2024, one of Meiser's relatives received $1,500 via Cash App from someone connected to an inmate and later told Meiser. Six days later, Meiser drove his BMW to a Chevron gas station in Valencia, parked next to a Chevrolet SUV, got out, and opened its trunk. Two women were inside the Chevrolet SUV. One woman knew a jail inmate. Meiser walked to the Chevrolet's driver's side, and one of the women gave him a plastic grocery bag containing two Pringles cans loaded with  511 grams (1.1 pounds) of heroin. The bag contained two white envelopes filled with $15,000 in cash.  The $15K represented Meiser's payment from the inmates for smuggling heroin into the jail.

Later that day, Meiser took the grocery bag and a loaded handgun and put them into his green backpack and drove to another LASD deputy's apartment complex. There, Meiser took the green backpack and put it in the deputy's truck. With Meiser in the passenger seat, the other deputy drove his truck into the jail, past the security point, and parked in the jail's parking lot.  Meiser, while holding the green backpack, got out of the deputy's truck carrying the green backpack, filled with heroin and cash, and put it inside the trunk of an LASD radio car. Eventually, Meiser put the two heroin-containing Pringles cans, which were hidden in a grocery bag, under computer towers inside the radio car's trunk.

By then, Meiser took $15,000 in cash from the grocery bag and put it into his green backpack. Meiser then closed the trunk, carried the green backpack to the other deputy's truck, placed it inside, and went to the jail's gym with the other deputy. Later that day, Meiser met with and spoke to an inmate involved in the smuggling scheme. At the end of the day, Meiser got in the passenger seat of the other deputy's truck. LASD investigators stopped them as the other deputy started driving the truck outside the jail.

          LASD investigators arrested Meiser and searched the other deputy's truck, where they found the green backpack containing $15,000 in cash, Meiser's loaded handgun, and his badge and LASD identification.