Olympian drug kingpin Ryan Wedding is CAUGHT after years on FBI Most Wanted list

The FBI has confirmed that murderer, cocaine trafficker and former Olympic snowboarder Ryan Wedding has been arrested and is currently detained in the United States.

NBC First to report arrestIt took place in Mexico City on Thursday night. The indictment was filed by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office.

Attorney General Pam Bondi claimed the 44-year-old Canadian was wanted by the FBI for an international drug ring that allegedly brought about 60 metric tons of cocaine a year into Southern California. Akil Davis, deputy director of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office, told reporters Friday that he will appear in court on Monday.

Wedding was allegedly under the protection of Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel for much of the last decade, and was compared by FBI director Kash Patel to that group’s jailed former leader, Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán.

The fugitive was charged with eight felonies in 2024, including three counts of murder and one count of attempted murder. Then in November 2025, a grand jury indictment against Wedding was announced, charging him with the death of a federal witness who was supposed to testify against the former snowboarder. According to authorities, this witness was shot to death at a restaurant in Medellín, Colombia, after Wedding put a “bounty” on his head with the help of a Canadian website.

The FBI recently increased the reward for information about Wedding to $15 million after the snowboarder spent nearly a decade on the run. It is not yet clear whether this money will be given to anyone. Similarly, details of Wedding’s arrest have not yet been released and Patel refused to go into further detail on Friday, saying he wanted to ‘protect’ the investigation.

Last month, federal authorities released a photo of a shirtless Wedding lying on his bed.

Wedding represented Canada at the 2002 Winter Olympics but did not win a medal.

‘Going to Mexico to find a man who has been on the run for years for some of the most horrific crimes on planet Earth requires an interagency effort led by the President. [Donald] Trump, our Department of Justice and our partners in Mexico and [we are] I’m very grateful for this partnership,” Patel told reporters in California on Friday.

This marks the sixth member of the FBI’s ‘Most Wanted’ list to be arrested this year.

Patel also thanked Mexico for its cooperation in taking down Wedding, as well as the RCMP.

He thanked US Ambassador to Mexico Ronald D. Johnson for being the ‘quarterback’ in this case last year.

Likewise, Bondi thanked Patel online for his contribution to the arrest: ‘Administrator Patel worked tirelessly to bring the fugitives to justice. We are grateful to our incredible Ambassador Ron Johnson and the Mexican authorities for assisting us with this case.’

The FBI’s search for The Wedding has been gathering momentum for some time.

A month ago, the FBI released never-before-seen photos of the seizure of a $40 million motorcycle believed to belong to Wedding. 62 motorcycles were among the seized items.

Alongside the footage, a statement from the FBI said: ‘Mexican authorities this month executed multiple search warrants and seized several motorcycles with an estimated value of approximately $40 million believed to belong to FBI Top Ten Fugitive Ryan James Wedding.

‘This successful seizure is the result of joint efforts between Mexican authorities, FBI, @RCMP and @LAPDHQ.’

Although unconfirmed, speculation on social media has claimed that some of the bikes have a famous history, potentially even being ridden by Valentino Rossi and Marc Marquez in MotoGP.

Additionally, during the latest operation, FBI agents found two vehicles, two Olympic medals, methamphetamine, marijuana, artwork and ammunition.

It is unclear who the medals belong to, as Wedding placed 24th in the parallel giant slalom at her only Olympic Games in Salt Lake City.

Canadian citizen believed to be living in Mexico considered armed and dangerous

The US Treasury Department recently alleged that Wedding created a ‘complex web of assets’ to hide his wealth using luxury cars, motorcycles, property, cryptocurrency and front businesses.’

In November, Patel said Wedding was responsible for ‘engineering a program of drug trafficking and narco terrorism that we have not seen in a long time’.

Bondi said the drug lord ‘controlled one of the most prolific and violent drug trafficking organizations in the world’.

Authorities also said there was “some evidence” that Wedding had undergone plastic surgery to change her appearance and avoid detection.

Earlier this month, the FBI added alleged Wedding accomplice Bianca Canastillo-Madrid to its ‘Wanted’ list. He was subject to a federal arrest warrant after being charged with distribution and possession with intent to distribute cocaine, conspiracy to export cocaine, and conspiracy to launder monetary instruments.

The wedding was wanted by the FBI and the organization was offering $15 million for information.

Approximately 201 kilos of cocaine were allegedly seized during Wedding’s drug smuggling operation. The seizure took place in 2025, before Wedding’s arrest this week.

A native of Thunder Bay, Ontario, Wedding became a competitive snowboarder in his youth before qualifying for the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics, where he finished 24th in the men’s parallel giant slalom.

He later took up bodybuilding and real estate speculation, and allegedly began growing marijuana in a 6,800-plant warehouse, which was later raided by the RCMP.

However, Wedding was not on the property at the time and evaded the investigation due to lack of evidence.

He is also accused of partnering with Iranian and Russian cocaine traffickers and was convicted in 2010 of trying to buy the drug from an undercover US government agent. He was sentenced to four years in prison and was released in 2011.

FBI Director Kash Patel calls former Olympian a ‘modern-day clone of Pablo Escobar’

62 motorcycles and Olympic medals were among the items seized by the Mexican government

Even though Wedding finished the games in 24th place, two Olympic medals were also found by the FBI.

Wedding was charged with murder and leading a cocaine trafficking cartel as part of the U.S. government’s Operation Giant Slalom in 2024.

Wedding, along with alleged accomplice Andrew Clark, allegedly ordered the killings of married couple Jagtar Sidhu, 57, and Harbhajan Sidhu, 55, in November 2023, as well as Mohammed Zafar, 39, in May 2024 and a federal witness in Colombia in January 2025.

The Sidhus were believed to have been killed over a stolen drug shipment, although Ontario Provincial Police Detective-Inspector Brian McDermott said in 2024 that the assassins ‘shot the wrong people’.

Their daughter, Jaspreet Kaur Sidhu, 28, was also shot 13 times in the attack but survived.

‘My father was shot in front of me,’ he told CBS News in 2024. ‘I heard my mother’s last screams. There was complete silence after that. Just gunshots.’