A former California deputy sheriff was arrested last year after being caught smuggling more than 100 pounds of fentanyl pills. His arrest was part of an investigation into the Sinaloa drug cartel previously run by “El Chapo.”

Jorge Oceguera-Rocha, 25, is believed to have been part of an intricate drug smuggling enterprise, using his position as a law enforcement official to aid the operations of the Mexican cartel.

Banning resident Jorge Oceguera-Rocha, 25, resigned his position as a correctional deputy after his arrest in September 2023.

According to officials, he was driving his private vehicle in Calimesa when he was pulled over. Inside his car, investigators say they found a gun and 104 pounds of fentanyl pills.

Investigators did not detail how they learned of Oceguera-Rocha’s alleged involvement in drug trafficking, but now it’s apparent that he was the “corrupt Riverside County Correctional Deputy” mentioned in a Wednesday press release touting Operation Hotline Bling, the Press-Enterprise explained.

That operation, which led to 15 arrests and the seizure of $16 million in narcotics, was aimed at the Sinaloa cartel’s activity in the Inland Empire.

Oceguera-Rocha was caught up in an investigation conducted by Riverside County sheriff’s investigators who were surveilling him. They had been monitoring the former deputy’s phone calls and picked him up as he was on his way from Victorville to Calimesa.

Oceguera-Rocha, 25, on Monday pleaded not guilty to charges of possession of narcotics for sale and transportation with the intent to distribute narcotics, both felonies, along with a sentencing enhancement of possession of a firearm while in the commission of a felony. The Banning resident, who had been assigned to the jail in that city, faces a maximum of 10 years in custody if convicted as charged, the District Attorney’s Office said.

Oceguera-Rocha was being held at John Benoit Detention Center in Indio in lieu of $5 million bail. A hearing on the bail has been set for Oct. 31. His attorney has not returned a phone message seeking comment.

A sheriff’s investigator filed a document in Superior Court asking a judge to make Oceguera-Rocha prove that if he attempts to make bail, the money came from a legal source.

The authorities found out about Oceguera-Rocha’s activities when they intercepted a call in September in which he said he would be traveling to a narcotics stash house in Victorville. He left about ten minutes after arriving at the house and headed to Calimesa.

As Oceguera-Rocha neared County Line Road on the 10 Freeway in Calimesa, a narcotics interdiction deputy pulled him over. A drug-detecting K9 alerted deputies to the odor of narcotics. In the trunk, the document says, deputies found four trash bags containing square-shaped packages wrapped with cellophane.

Inside the packages were blue, fentanyl-laced M30 pills — almost 520,000 of them, the document says.

One of the investigators wrote in a report that Oceguera-Rocha was carrying enough fentanyl “to kill approximately 2 million people.”

Fentanyl smuggled over the southern border has become a deadly problem for many Americans, especially amid the ongoing border crisis. Cartels have been taking advantage of the problems at the border, smuggling drugs and people into the country.

The opioid has been the cause of tens of thousands of drug deaths, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. What makes the drug particularly pernicious is that it is often laced into regular street drugs, meaning that those consuming the opioid are not aware they are doing so.