Olympic snowboarder needed by FBI for cocaine distribution and homicide

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Olympic snowboarder needed by FBI for cocaine distribution and homicide

A former Olympic snowboarder for Canada has been charged with working a drug trafficking ring that shipped huge quantities of cocaine throughout the Americas and killed 4 folks, authorities mentioned Thursday.

The FBI is providing a $50,000 reward for info resulting in the arrest and extradition of Ryan James Wedding ceremony, a Canadian citizen who was residing in Mexico and is taken into account a fugitive. The 43-year-old is charged in the USA with working a prison enterprise, homicide, conspiring to distribute cocaine and different crimes, US prosecutors mentioned.

US authorities mentioned Wedding ceremony’s group moved giant shipments of cocaine from Colombia via Mexico and California to Canada and different places in the USA utilizing long-haul semi-trucks. Wedding ceremony, who additionally faces years-old costs in Canada, is one among 16 folks charged in reference to a hoop that moved 60 tons of cocaine a yr, and 4 of them stay fugitives, mentioned Martin Estrada, US legal professional in Los Angeles.

“He selected to turn into a significant drug trafficker and he selected to turn into a killer,” Estrada instructed reporters.

A photograph of former Canadian Olympic snowboarder Ryan Wedding ceremony, 43, who’s a fugitive, is seen high left, with 15 different defendants who’ve been charged with allegedly working and collaborating in a transnational drug trafficking operation, is displayed on a video monitor at a information convention on the FBI workplaces in Los Angeles on Thursday. {Photograph}: Damian Dovarganes/AP

Krysti Hawkins, FBI particular agent in cost in Los Angeles, mentioned a dozen folks had been arrested in Florida, Michigan, Canada, Colombia and Mexico in reference to the case.

US authorities allege the group killed two members of a household in Canada in retaliation for a stolen drug cargo in what officers there mentioned was a case of mistaken identification in addition to two different folks, based on officers and federal courtroom filings. Authorities mentioned they seized cocaine, weapons, ammunition, money and greater than $3m in cryptocurrency in reference to their investigation.

Wedding ceremony competed for Canada within the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake Metropolis, authorities mentioned.

Wedding ceremony faces separate drug trafficking costs in Canada that date again to 2015, mentioned Chris Leather-based, chief superintendent with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. “These costs are very a lot unresolved,” Leather-based mentioned.

Wedding ceremony beforehand was convicted within the US of conspiracy to distribute cocaine and was sentenced to jail in 2010, federal information present. Estrada mentioned US authorities consider that after Wedding ceremony’s launch, he resumed drug trafficking and has been protected by the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico.


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