Stunning new footage has emerged of Olympic snowboarder-turned-alleged drug kingpin Ryan Wedding arriving in the US in handcuffs following his arrest.
Wedding, who represented Canada at the 2002 Winter Olympics, was among the FBI’s 10 most-wanted fugitives. He spent more than a decade on the run before handing himself into the authorities.
The 44-year-old is accused of leading a billion-dollar drug-smuggling operation and orchestrating several murders.
He has been labelled a ‘modern-day iteration of Pablo Escobar’ and was believed to be living in Mexico under the protection of the notorious Sinaloa Cartel.
On Friday, a plane carrying Wedding was seen touching down in Ontario, California.
The former Olympian, who wore jeans and a black cap, towered above FBI agents as they escorted down on to the runway in handcuffs. He was followed by FBI director Kash Patel.
Stunning new footage has emerged of Ryan Wedding arriving in the US in handcuffs
Wedding represented Canada during the Winter Olympics in 2002 but he did not win a medal
Authorities across the US, Canada and Mexico had been hunting Wedding, with the FBI offering a reward of $15milion for information leading to his arrest.
But he is said to have turned himself in to the US embassy in Mexico City. Mexico’s security secretary Omar García Harfuch wrote on social media that Patel held meetings in Mexico on Thursday and left the following day with two detainees.
One of those in custody was a Canadian citizen who turned himself in. The Associated Press reported that was Wedding.
Attorney General Pam Bondi claims that the 44-year-old Canadian had been wanted over an alleged transnational drug ring that is responsible for bringing around 60 metric tons of cocaine into Southern California annually.
Wedding was allegedly under the protection Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel for the better part of the last decade and was compared by Patel to that group’s imprisoned former leader, Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán.
He was previously convicted in the United States on cocaine distribution charges and later served three and a half years years of a four-year prison sentence.
In 2024, he was hit with eight felony charges, including three counts of murder, and last November, a grand jury indictment against Wedding was unsealed.
He was charged with the death of a federal witness who was supposed to testify against the former snowboarder.
On Friday, law enforcement officials revealed Wedding had been arrested and put in custody
The 44-year-old is accused of leading a billion-dollar drug-smuggling operation
NBC was the first to report the arrest, which took place in Mexico City on Thursday night. Wedding will stand before a judge on Monday, FBI Los Angeles Field Office assistant director Akil Davis told reporters Friday.
Shortly after Wedding was apprehended, Patel described the 44-year-old as ‘a modern-day El Chapo’ and claimed ‘he went from an Olympic snowboarder to the largest narco trafficker in modern times.’
The FBI director continued: ‘It goes without saying to go down to Mexico to find a guy who’s been on the lam for multiple years for some of the most egregious crimes on planet Earth, takes an inter agency-wide effort led out by President [Donald] Trump, our DOJ and our partners in Mexico, and [we are] very grateful for that partnership.’
This marks the sixth member of the FBI’s ‘Ten Most Wanted’ list who has been arrested this year, according to Patel.
The FBI Director also thanked Mexico for its cooperation in taking down Wedding, as well as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP). US Ambassador to Mexico, Ronald D. Johnson, was credited with ‘quarterbacking’ this case over the last year.
Bondi, meanwhile, thanked Patel online for his contributions to the arrest: ‘Director Patel has worked tirelessly to bring fugitives to justice. We are grateful to our incredible Ambassador Ron Johnson and the Mexican authorities for assisting us in this case.’
