How Ryan Wedding went from Olympian to alleged drug lord needed by FBI – National | USAEMALL.com

Before he landed on the FBI’s list of most wanted fugitives for allegedly leading an international drug trafficking ring, Ryan Wedding was an aspiring professional snowboarder chasing Olympic glory.

The story of how Wedding went from representing Team Canada at the 2002 Winter Games to becoming what U.S. authorities have called “a modern-day iteration of Pablo Escobar” involves dashed athletic dreams and a broken promise to reform after his first arrest in the United States while trying to purchase cocaine for distribution.

The FBI and U.S. prosecutors say Wedding has since grown his criminal enterprise to become the largest supplier of cocaine to Canada, as well as parts of the U.S. That journey allegedly involves the murder of rivals and potential witnesses, according to the latest indictment against him and other alleged members of the organization.

“He chose to become a major drug trafficker, and he chose to become a killer,” Martin Estrada, the U.S. attorney for California’s central district, told reporters in November while announcing the newest charges against Wedding.

Now, the man also known by the aliases “El Jefe,” “Giant” and “Public Enemy” faces a US$15-million reward for his capture and an international manhunt involving Canadian, American and Mexican authorities.

The investigation has intensified in recent weeks, with police arresting numerous alleged associates and seizing property tied to Wedding, including several motorcycles.

Wedding’s whereabouts are still unknown, but officials say he is believed to be hiding in Mexico under protection from the notorious Sinaloa Cartel.

Here’s what court documents, law enforcement, athletic records and media reports have pieced together about Wedding’s life.

Wedding was born in 1981 in Thunder Bay, Ont., where his maternal grandparents owned the Mount Baldy ski resort. His uncle, Craig Spiess, was a skiing instructor and coached the women’s national alpine ski team before taking over operations at Mount Baldy in the early 1990s.

When Wedding was 12, his family moved to Coquitlam, B.C., just outside Vancouver, where he first took up snowboarding.

Wedding began competing professionally as a snowboarder in 1997, according to International Ski and Snowboard Federation records, racing in events around the world.

He won the bronze medal in the parallel giant slalom at the 1999 junior world championship in Italy, and silver at the world juniors in 2001 in Austria.

After qualifying for the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City, he placed a disappointing 24th in the men’s giant slalom event.

Although he competed a few more times that same season — including second-place finishes in the Canadian championship — he stopped competing after failing to finish his final run in March 2002.

Following his Olympic run, Wedding moved back to Vancouver, where he enrolled in Simon Fraser University. He began working as a bouncer after building up his body in the gym, according to investigations by Toronto Life and Rolling Stone.

He dropped out of school two years later and began growing marijuana in a rural warehouse in Maple Ridge, B.C., those profiles found.

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In 2006, the RCMP raided the property known as Eighteen Carrot Farms and seized $10 million worth of dried and live cannabis as well as a shotgun and “numerous rounds of ammunition,” Toronto Life reported.

Wedding’s official biography on the Olympics website says he was named in the RCMP’s search warrant but he was never charged, reportedly due to a lack of evidence.

By 2008, according to authorities, Wedding had joined up with a new group of criminals intent on smuggling cocaine into Canada from the U.S.

In June of that year, Wedding and two other men were arrested in San Diego, Calif., after meeting with a source they thought would supply them 24 kilograms of cocaine. The plan, according to an FBI affidavit, was to pay US$17,000 for a sample and then purchase the rest of the drugs.

The source turned out to be an undercover FBI informant who had recorded their conversations. Police found approximately US$100,000 hidden in a piece of furniture in Wedding’s hotel room after his arrest, the affidavit said.

Wedding pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to distribute cocaine. He was convicted by a jury in late 2009 after a trial that saw his co-accused, who had pleaded guilty, testify against him.

Despite facing a minimum of 10 years in prison, the judge sentenced him to just four years after Wedding struck a sentencing agreement where he accepted responsibility in exchange for a reduced sentence.

During his sentencing hearing in May 2010, Wedding apologized to the court, the U.S. government and “my amazingly supportive family for the stupid and irresponsible decisions that I made,” according to a court transcript.

“Your Honour, what I did was completely out of character for me, and it is a personal mission of mine to rebuild my reputation,” he told the judge.

“As an athlete, I was always taught that there’s no second chances, and, well, I’m here asking for exactly that.”

U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Miller appeared to sympathize with Wedding, citing his “full and heartfelt statement of remorse” while explaining his sentencing decision.

“I really have no doubt in my mind that Mr. Wedding will not be involved in this kind of conduct in the future — certainly not in the United States, that’s for sure — and I believe that he has learned a very, very important lesson here,” he said.

Wedding was released from federal prison in December 2011 and was deported back to Canada, according to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons and immigration records.

U.S. prosecutors say Wedding began growing his criminal enterprise immediately after his release. Investigators allege that, while in prison, Wedding made connections with associates of the Sinaloa Cartel, which was expanding its drug export operations into Canada at the time.

By 2013, the RCMP had begun investigating Wedding and his alleged leadership of an operation that would traffic cocaine from Colombia and other Latin American countries, across the U.S.-Mexico border and into Canada.

After a two-year investigation, RCMP conducted raids across the country in 2015 and seized more than 200 kilograms of cocaine as well as vehicles, firearms, cash and drug paraphernalia, according to media reports at the time.

Fifteen people were charged, including Wedding, who managed to evade capture while other alleged co-conspirators were arrested.

Wedding allegedly fled to Mexico, where he has remained under cartel protection, U.S. prosecutors say.

According to multiple U.S. indictments, Wedding has since grown his criminal organization into a billion-dollar enterprise that transports “hundreds of kilograms of cocaine” from Colombian “cocaine kitchens” to Mexico by boat and plane.

The drugs are then allegedly smuggled into Southern California on semi-trucks before they are distributed to Canada and other American states by Canadian drug transportation networks.

U.S. prosecutors say Wedding has directed multiple murders to be carried out on behalf of his organization.

In November 2023, two people in the same family were killed and a third was seriously injured in their Caledon, Ont., home, in apparent retaliation for a stolen drug shipment. Ontario Provincial Police have said the family was “completely innocent,” and both the police force and U.S. prosecutors say they were mistakenly targeted.

Prosecutors allege Wedding also ordered the murder of another victim in May 2024 over a drug debt. Peel Regional Police said in 2024 the victim was a 39-year-old man from Brampton, Ont.

In October 2024, after U.S. prosecutors first announced drug trafficking and murder charges against Wedding, he began seeking the location of a potential witness to be killed, offering a reward of up to US$5 million, according to a new indictment unsealed this past November.

That federal witness was ultimately found and murdered in January 2025 in Medellin, Colombia, prosecutors say.

The FBI added Wedding to its list of 10 most wanted fugitives in March of this year.

The latest indictment says a Canadian lawyer, Deepak Paradkar, advised Wedding that killing the witness would prevent his extradition to the U.S. and that the initial drug charges would be dismissed.

Paradkar was arrested and charged as part of the international investigation into Wedding and his organization, known as Operation Giant Slalom. He has been granted bail in Ontario as he awaits his own extradition.

To date, 36 people reportedly tied to Wedding’s operation have been arrested and charged, including at least eight Canadians, and several remain wanted.

Mexican authorities conducted a series of raids in December and seized several motorcycles worth about US$40 million that the FBI says are believed to be owned by Wedding, along with artwork and Olympic medals.

The FBI in November seized a rare Mercedes-Benz sports car it said was linked to Wedding’s organization.