Seven Canadians charged in U.S. drug probe linked to ex-Olympian

WASHINGTON — Seven Canadians have been arrested for extradition to the United States in connection with a drug trafficking probe involving Ryan Wedding, a former Team Canada Olympian turned fugitive.

“Our work is not done. Fugitive Ryan Wedding remains one of the top threats to Canadian public safety,” said RCMP Commissioner Michael Duheme at the U.S. Justice Department in Washington on Wednesday.

Duheme joined U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel and other American officials to announce the arrests of 10 people, including the seven in Canada, and ongoing efforts to take Wedding into custody through what the U.S. government is calling “Operation Giant Slalom.”

Wedding is on the FBI’s most wanted list and U.S. indictments for his arrest allege he maintains through violence and murder a criminal enterprise that brings bulk amounts of cocaine into the United States and Canada.

Wedding is believed to be hiding in Mexico. The U.S. State Department has increased the reward for information leading to his arrest to US$15 million.

Wedding, originally from Thunder Bay, Ont., competed for Canada as a snowboarder in the 2002 Winter Olympics. Canadian and American law enforcement allege that in the years that followed the Salt Lake City games, he became deeply involved in drug trafficking.

He was convicted in the U.S. of conspiracy to distribute cocaine and was sentenced to prison in 2010. U.S. authorities have alleged that after Wedding’s release from prison, he resumed drug trafficking under the protection of the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico.

U.S. court documents said Wedding’s drug trafficking enterprise brought cocaine from Colombia into Mexico, then used semitrailers to distribute the drug in the United States and Canada.

Bondi accused Wedding of being the largest cocaine trafficker in Canada and alleged he spread drugs throughout the U.S., harming families and communities.

“This guy is responsible for a tremendous amount of that horror,” Bondi said.

A newly unsealed U.S. indictment connects Wedding to the January 2025 murder of a federal witness in a separate criminal case.

“The murder of a witness in Colombia earlier this year was a cruel, cold-blooded act that could not and did not go unanswered,” said Bill Essayli, first assistant United States attorney for the Central District of California.

U.S. officials allege Wedding issued an order to murder the witness in an effort to stop separate criminal prosecutions and attempts to extradite him.

Officials allege a bounty was placed through a post on the Canadian-run website “The Dirty News” featuring a picture of the witness, who was later shot to death in a Colombian restaurant.

U.S. authorities charged the website’s co-founder Gursewak Singh Bal, 31, of Mississauga, Ont., alleging he agreed not to post about Wedding in exchange for money, and instead posted a photo of the witness before his murder.

Essayli said U.S. authorities seized the website Tuesday and it no longer exists.

U.S. authorities also charged Canadian lawyer Deepak Balwant Paradkar, 62, of Thornhill, Ont., alleging he provided Wedding with illicit advice about the murder of the witness and court documents to which the former snowboarder should not have had access.

U.S. immigration action was also taken against Paradkar’s daughter, a Canadian lawyer who lives in Chicago.

The other Canadians arrested include Atna Ohna, 40, and Edwin Basora-Hernandez, 31, from Quebec, Allistair Chapman, 33, and Ahmad Nabil Zitoun, 35, from Alberta, and Rolan Sokolovski, 37, from Toronto.

Law enforcement said it continues to search for 32-year-old Rasheed Pascua Hossain from Vancouver and 35-year-old Tommy Demorizi from Montréal, who is believed to be in the Dominican Republic.

In addition to the criminal charges, the United States also sanctioned Wedding and other people the U.S. Treasury Department alleged were part of his criminal trafficking ring, including Canadians.

Ontario Provincial Police have alleged Wedding and another Canadian directed the Nov. 20, 2023 murders of two members of a family in Caledon, Ont. Police have said the family was targeted mistakenly.

Two murders in Ontario’s Niagara and Peel regions last year were also linked by police to the alleged drug ring.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 19, 2025.

Kelly Geraldine Malone, The Canadian Press