NPR

Former Canadian Olympian is accused of being a fugitive drug lord

By Bill Chappell

Published October 18, 2024 at 2:21 AM PDT

In 2002, Ryan Wedding competed in the men's parallel giant slalom snowboarding event for Canada at the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics. He's now being pursued by federal agents under a U.S. operation dubbed Giant Slalom.

Updated October 18, 2024 at 14:10 PM ET

Ryan Wedding, who represented Canada in snowboarding at the Salt Lake City Olympics in 2002, is now a fugitive from the U.S. justice system, accused of leading a violent international drug trafficking ring. Wedding allegedly orchestrated the shipment of tons of cocaine from Colombia to Mexico, the U.S. and Canada -- and he’s accused of ordering multiple killings.

The FBI says Wedding, 43, is a fugitive and may be in Mexico. A federal arrest warrant was issued for him one month ago in the U.S. Central District Court in Los Angeles. He's been working with the notorious Sinaloa Cartel, the U.S. Attorney's Office tells NPR.

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A grand jury indictment was first filed in June, charging Wedding with numerous felonies. He is the lead defendant in a superseding indictment that was unsealed this week, naming 16 people in all.

Ryan Wedding appears on an FBI wanted poster. The U.S. says Wedding, 43, is a fugitive and may be in Mexico.

“They have triggered an avalanche of violent crimes, including brutal murders,” Matthew Allen, special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Los Angeles division, said in a statement. “Wedding, the Olympian snowboarder, went from navigating slopes to contouring a life of incessant crimes.”

Authorities allege that the drug conspiracy operated on a large scale, listing locations from Colombia and Mexico to three California counties -- Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino -- and Miami-Dade County, Fla.

Agents were able to monitor the group’s actions earlier this year, thanks to a mole who relayed coded messages about alleged drug shipments sent on the encrypted messaging application Threema, according to the indictment.

The indictment describes an elaborate system in which transportation dispatchers based in Canada allegedly used dollar-bill serial numbers as “tokens” to verify co-conspirators’ identities as they arranged for semi-trucks to carry tons of cocaine from Southern California into Canada. The alleged leaders of the enterprise’s transportation arm agreed to a flat fee of $220,000 Canadian for each load, according to court documents.

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As part of the federal investigation -- dubbed Operation Giant Slalom, echoing an Olympic event Wedding once competed in -- law enforcement agents caught defendants with a total of some 1,800 kilograms (1.8 metric tons) of cocaine, according to the Justice Department. They also seized guns, $255,400 in cash, and more than $3.2 million in cryptocurrency.

This week, Operation Giant Slalom’s reach extended to an elite enclave in Aventura, Fla. The FBI raided a mansion worth millions of dollars that a defendant, Miami Beach music executive and restaurateur Nahim Jorge Bonilla, had reportedly bought from music star DJ Khaled.

Stacks of cocaine are seen in a Justice Department image from Aug. 1, when some 201 kgs of cocaine were seized in Riverside County, Calif., as part of an investigation into an international trafficking ring.

Wedding had sent Bonilla 12 kilograms of cocaine, according to the indictment -- 7 that were paid for, and 5 on consignment. In June, Wedding threatened to kill Bonilla’s mother if the remaining debt wasn’t settled within three days, court papers say. Within a week, Bonilla allegedly paid Wedding for 2 kilograms of cocaine and sent 20 kilograms of methamphetamine to Montreal, Canada, to settle the rest of the debt.

In other cases, murders were allegedly carried out.

“Wedding and Clark allegedly directed the November 20, 2023, murders of two members of a family in Ontario, Canada, in retaliation for a stolen drug shipment,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office says. The agency says another person was killed in May over an unpaid debt, allegedly on Wedding and Clark’s orders.

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Twelve of the 16 defendants have been arrested. They include four Canadians arrested in Ontario this week, and three Canadians arrested in the U.S., according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. But Wedding and several others remain at large.

If convicted, Wedding and several co-defendants “would face a mandatory minimum penalty of life in federal prison on the murder and attempted murder charges,” according to the Justice Department. Other charges in the case also carry similarly stiff penalties.

It’s the second time U.S. authorities have leveled serious drug charges against Wedding: In 2009, he was convicted of conspiracy to distribute cocaine and served more than a year in prison. Canadian authorities had also previously investigated him as part of drug inquests.