Court documents reveal a popular social media influencer and comedian arrested this summer in San Diego County may have supplied the drugs that led to a Ramona woman's suspected fatal overdose.
San Diego Police Department officers arrested Michael Steen II, the man behind the social media personalities "Yung Poppy" and "Kiesha Red," which have a combined 2.6 million followers on Instagram, in July on drug possession charges.
According to a probable cause document submitted to the court so investigators could obtain a warrant to search Steen's phone, his arrest was the culmination of an investigation launched by detectives with the SDPD and the San Diego Sheriff's Department's joint Narcotics Task Force.
Task force investigators were called to a Ramona home on July 10 of this year after a woman was found dead of a suspected drug overdose.
Investigators found heroin and M30 Oxycodone pills in her room and said the pills she had were believed to be counterfeits containing the deadly drug fentanyl.
The woman's boyfriend told investigators that she smoked both heroin and crushed oxycodone pills, according to the document.
Investigators searched the woman's phone and found a text conversation from the day before with a person under the contact name "Yung" who identified themselves as "Yung P."
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The woman and Yung P organized a meetup at her workplace to buy Oxycodone pills, the document said.
Investigators took to social media to research Yung P's identity and found multiple profiles on several social media platforms for both "Yung Poppy," also known as Yung P, and "Kiesha Red." A Facebook page implied that Yung Poppy and Kiesha Red were personality's portrayed by the same actor, and a LinkedIn page for Yung Poppy suggested the actor's name was Michael Steen, 25, born in Chula Vista.
Investigators also found a narcotics ad on Craiglist that listed the same phone number Yung P used to communicate with the overdose victim.
An SDPD detective posing undercover messaged the number and set up a meeting to buy eight Oxycodone pills for a total of $650.
According to the document, the detective met with a man who identified himself as "Yung" and they exchanged the drugs and money in the man's Mercedes Benz.
The document says the undercover detective got out of the car and signaled to staged officers that the transaction was complete, and authorities arrested the man and his girlfriend who was also in the car.
Yung was identified by police as Michael Steen. Officers searched his vehicle and found 144 additional Oxycodone pills, marijuana, a scale and $8,300.
Steen and his girlfriend were charged with transportation of a controlled narcotic and possession of narcotics for sale.
A former neighbor to Steen at an apartment complex in Chula Vista said there was frequent commotion at Steen's place.
"I would be woken up at 2, 3 in the morning. 4:30," the neighbor who didn't want to be identified said. "There was times when there would be arguing out in the plaza."
She said she was home when investigators raided his apartment.
The neighbor described Steen as having a lot of ambition and "seemed like he was going to conquer the world."
