The former Pitchess Detention Center deputy had “blown his entire savings” on a home, only to find that it immediately needed major renovations.
A trusted man in Operation Safe Jails, inside one of the nation’s largest jails, he had befriended several “shot-callers,” whom his higher-ups encouraged him to work with to help tamp down violence and use of force in the facility, according to his psychologist’s report.
Ex-Deputy Michael Meiser was then “asked by the shot-callers to bring in other items instead of food, including jewelry and explicit photos that were provided by inmates’ family members,” according to a sentencing memo Meiser’s attorneys submitted on his behalf.
Meiser, subject of a wide-ranging local-federal investigation into drug smuggling at local jails, pleaded guilty in July to one count of possession with intent to distribute for his role in bringing drugs into Castaic’s North County Correctional Facility.
Now he’s seeking a sentence 10 months below the federal government’s recommendation for several reasons he listed in the memo.
Department of Justice officials wrote that Meiser “exhibited a reckless disregard for human life,” after having “a front-row seat to repeated inmate overdoses” for months leading up to his arrest. Law enforcement officials also reported a thread of text messages from Meiser and his fellow deputies discussing the ongoing overdoses.
He now faces a recommendation for 70 months in federal prison. A DOJ memo on his sentencing recommendation, which scales potential penalties on multiple factors, noted that Meiser received a reduction for having no record, but also had several “aggravating factors.”
Meiser now hopes the court will also consider the ailing father he’s now a caretaker for and the impact on the family he will leave behind, in considering his request for a five-year sentence at a facility in Southern California, with four years of supervised release and “appropriate consideration of the safety concerns posed by his former status as a sworn law enforcement officer.”
Meiser’s request
Meiser acknowledged his own accountability in a plea for leniency.
“I fully understand that I am before this court because of my own circumstances, and I recognize the seriousness of this process. I am not asking the court to overlook my responsibility or excuse my actions,” he wrote in a letter to the judge. “Rather, I am asking the court to consider the very real consequences that my absence would have on two elderly parents, particularly my father, who is living with a debilitating and progressive disease.”
His sentencing request offered broad criticism of the Sheriff’s Department culture around drug use in local jails, which came from a psychologist’s report of an interview with Meiser.
By way of providing context for his actions, he indicated “throughout his career with the Sherrif’s Department, the supervisors did not seem to care when they found drugs,” according to the psychologist’s report.
“‘They would say, ‘If they overdose and kill themselves, that’s their problem,’” adding that he “’caught multiple people with dope through the years, and I don’t think one got prosecuted,’” according to the psychoanalysis. “‘This was part of it, why do you care if they don’t care? It was stupid, but I thought it would solve my immediate problems.’”
He also offered insights on the relationship between the inmates in Castaic and its jailers, which he told the psychologist was a factor in how he created a connection with his smuggling co-conspirators.
“Meiser explained that his commander wanted ‘force numbers’ to go down, meaning that they wanted less instances where staff had to pepper spray inmates at the bars amidst an altercation,” according to the psychologist’s report. “Mr. Meiser knew that the Latino gangs had a rule where if they were beating up an inmate, they had to keep beating that person until someone ran to the bars and got pepper sprayed by staff. Mr. Meiser met with the Latino shot-callers to discuss a compromise whereby they would not let inmates run to the bars during physical altercations. This would ultimately reduce the ‘force numbers,’ but Mr. Meiser also explained to his commander that this would likely lead to more serious injuries given that there would not be a point where the altercations would immediately stop. Mr. Meiser’s commander indicated that she was on board with the compromise Mr. Meiser had arranged with the shot-callers, and immediately the ‘force numbers’ began to decline,” according to the report.
Meiser’s employee records in the memo reflected very positive performance reviews prior to his arrest.
The L.A. County Sheriff’s Department issued a statement Wednesday in response to Meiser’s claims in Meiser’s sentencing memo.
“The department has zero tolerance for employees becoming compromised or engaging in criminal activity. Personnel are held accountable for their individual actions, including administrative discipline and potential criminal prosecution for founded cases of misconduct,” according to the statement on behalf of the agency from Nicole Nishida, its communications manager. “Our personnel are expected to remain professional and take the necessary appropriate action to protect the safety of those in our custody. The department remains committed to reducing unnecessary uses of force while ensuring that the safety and well-being of incarcerated individuals remain our highest priority.”
The statement also mentioned numerous screening efforts, and investigative efforts by two teams, the Custody Investigative Services Unit and Operation Safe Jails, the latter of which Meiser helped play a role on at Pitchess.
Meiser’s attorney indicated that while his client acknowledged a “stupid” mistake made while trying to stay on top of his home’s growing cost and his father’s increasing medical bills, a slight reduction of the recommendation is appropriate.
The attorney, Daniel Perlman, also provided a handful of similar offenses where the former jailer or law enforcement officers received sentences ranging from 15 months to several years for their jail-smuggling violations.
“A sentence of 60 months is a severe punishment for a 41-year-old father of three who has no prior criminal record and who has spent nearly two years in therapy, and who has already lost his career, his professional certification, and his family’s financial security,” Perlman wrote. “That sentence, combined with four years of supervised release, is ‘sufficient, but not greater than necessary,’ to satisfy the purposes of sentencing set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).”
