Former Canadian Olympian and alleged drug boss Ryan James Wedding is now in police custody after being arrested in Mexico City.
Wedding, a former Olympic snowboarder who represented Canada at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, is suspected of heading a transnational drug-trafficking operation and has been linked to several murders in North America, including at least four in Ontario.
FBI Director Kash Patel said Wedding was taken into custody on the night of Jan. 22 and was transported from Mexico to the United States by the FBI. He will be held in custody over the weekend and will appear in court on Jan. 26.
“[Wedding] went from an Olympic snowboarder to the largest narco-trafficker in modern times,” Patel said during a Jan. 23 press conference at Ontario International Airport near Los Angeles.
“This individual and his organization in the Sinaloa cartel, poured narcotics into the streets of North America and killed too many of our youth and corrupted too many of our citizens. And that ends today.”
FBI Director Kash Patel speaks during a news conference about the arrest of former Canadian Olympian Ryan Wedding on multinational drug trafficking charges in Ontario, Calif., on Jan. 23, 2026. AP Photo/Amy Taxin
Wedding, 44, was placed on the FBI’s “10 most-wanted” fugitives list last year after spending more than a decade on the run from authorities. A reward of up to US$15 million was issued last November for information leading to his arrest and conviction.
The former athlete is also known as “El Jefe,” “Giant,” and “Public Enemy,” and was described by Patel as “a modern day” El Chapo and Pablo Escobar. El Chapo is the former top leader of the Sinaloa cartel and Escobar is the Colombian drug lord who founded the Medellín cartel.
Patel said the arrest of Wedding in Mexico required an “interagency-wide effort” that included U.S. authorities as well as those in Mexico and the RCMP. He would not comment on if any tips leading to Wedding’s arrest would be eligible for the reward and also declined to offer details of the capture, citing “operational sensitivities.”
RCMP Commissioner Mike Duheme, who also attended the press conference, thanked Canadian and American investigators for their roles in Wedding’s arrest and said multinational collaboration was key to the success of the operation.
“No single agency or nation can combat transnational organized crime alone,” he said. “We can finally say that our communities, our countries are much safer with the arrest of Ryan Wedding.”
Assistant director of the FBI’s Los Angeles field office Akil Davis said Wedding was suspected of moving roughly 60 metric tonnes of cocaine through California “on its way to Canada” as well as for allegedly “orchestrating multiple murders of victims and government witnesses.”
The FBI had identified Wedding as being suspected of masterminding a drug-trafficking network that “routinely” shipped cocaine from Colombia to the United States and Canada via Mexico and southern California. Wedding was just one of several Canadians named in the sweeping indictment announced in October 2024.
Since then, Wedding has been implicated in several murders and attempted murders in Southern Ontario over the past few years as well as the murder of a key witness in a 2024 federal narcotics case in the United States.
Lead-up to Charges
Police have previously accused Wedding of ordering at least four murders in Ontario.The Thunder Bay, Ont., native and his alleged “second-in-command,” Andrew Clark are accused of orchestrating the murders of an Indian couple in Caledon, Ont., in November 2023. The couple was mistakenly targeted in retaliation for a stolen drug shipment, police said at the time. The Caledon murders were later connected to three residential shootings in Brampton, Ont., and a homicide in Mississauga, Ont.
The pair also allegedly ordered the April 2024 Niagara Falls killing of 29-year-old Randy Fader.
Clark, a Toronto native, was arrested in 2024 and was extradited to the U.S. early last year to face charges in California.
Seven other Canadians connected to Wedding were arrested late last year as part of a joint U.S.-Canada initiative known as Operation Giant Slalom. One of the suspects was Wedding’s lawyer, who is accused of recommending the murder of the U.S. federal witness so that Wedding and Clark could avoid extradition from Mexico.
Wedding faces several federal charges in the United States, including conspiracy to export cocaine, continuing a criminal enterprise, murder and attempted murder in connection with a criminal enterprise, and drug crime. He is also accused of witness tampering and intimidation. He will be subject to a mandatory minimum penalty of life in federal prison if convicted.
