Ryan Wedding, 43, was indicted with 15 others on charges of trafficking drugs into Canada and the U.S., the authorities said. He is believed to be living in Mexico.
A Canadian snowboarder who competed at the 2002 Winter Olympics is wanted by the F.B.I. on charges of conspiring to ship hundreds of kilograms of cocaine into Canada and the United States and on suspicion of orchestrating multiple murders, the U.S. attorney’s office for the Central District of California announced in a statement on Thursday.
The snowboarder, Ryan James Wedding, 43, born in Thunder Bay, Ontario, was indicted along with 15 others on charges of running a transnational drug trafficking operation that shipped bulk quantities of cocaine from California to Canada from about January to April 2024, the U.S. attorney’s office said in its statement. Mr. Wedding, a fugitive who was believed to be living in Mexico, was charged with eight felonies including one count of conspiracy to export cocaine and three counts of murder in connection with a drug crime.
“An Olympic athlete-turned-drug lord is now charged with leading a transnational organized crime group that engaged in cocaine trafficking and murder, including of innocent civilians,” Martin Estrada, the U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, said.
Last year, Mr. Wedding and another defendant, Andrew Clark, 34, directed the “murders of two members of a family in Ontario, Canada,” in retaliation “for a stolen drug shipment,” the U.S. attorney’s office said. Mr. Clark was arrested earlier this month, the statement said. The duo also “ordered the murder of another victim” over a drug debt in May, according to the statement.
Mr. Wedding, who had aliases including El Jefe, Giant and Public Enemy, was the leader of the criminal network, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said. The Canadian police said methamphetamines had also been trafficked by the network. Mr. Wedding “is wanted by the United States and Canada on separate charges,” the Canadian police said.
There is no lawyer listed as a representative for Mr. Wedding. In 2010, Mr. Wedding was sentenced by a U.S. judge to four years in prison for conspiracy to distribute cocaine, according to court records.
In 2006, Ryan Wedding was named in a search warrant in Maple Ridge, British Columbia, in an investigation concerning large quantities of marijuana, but he was never charged, according to his athlete profile on Olympics.com.
The F.B.I. is offering a reward of up to $50,000 for any information leading to Mr. Wedding’s arrest.
A majority of the 16 people named in the indictment were captured by the authorities in the United States and Canada as part of an operation led by the F.B.I. called Operation Giant Slalom, the Canadian police said. Slalom is an Olympic event in which competitors are timed as they ski or snowboard down a slope while weaving through a flagged obstacle course.
Mr. Wedding placed 24th in the parallel giant slalom snowboarding event in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
Sheelagh McNeill contributed research.
Source: Elections - nytimes.com
