Former Olympic Snowboarder Is Now a Fugitive

A former Olympic snowboarder for Canada has been charged with running a drug trafficking ring that shipped vast amounts of cocaine across the Americas and killed several people, authorities said Thursday. The FBI is offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and extradition of Ryan James Wedding, a Canadian citizen who was living in Mexico and is considered a fugitive, the AP reports. The 43-year-old is charged in the United States with running a criminal enterprise, murder, conspiring to distribute cocaine, and other crimes, US prosecutors said. Wedding competed for Canada in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

US authorities said Wedding's group moved large shipments of cocaine from Colombia through Mexico and California to Canada and other locations in the US using long-haul semi-trucks. Wedding is one of 16 people charged in connection with a ring that moved 60 tons of cocaine a year, and four of them remain fugitives, said Martin Estrada, US Attorney in Los Angeles. "Instead of using the privileges that come with being an Olympic athlete to do good for people, he did the opposite," Estrada said. "He chose to become a major drug trafficker and he chose to become a killer." Estrada said Wedding "went from navigating slopes to contouring a life of incessant crimes," NBC News reports.

Authorities say Wedding and Andrew Clark, a fellow Canadian who was arrested earlier this month, ordered the murders of at least three people in Ontario. The victims included a couple from India who were visiting their daughter, who was seriously injured in the shooting, the CBC reports. Police say the killings were ordered in retaliation for a stolen drug shipment in California, but it was a case of mistaken identity and none of the victims had any connection to Wedding's organization. Wedding also faces drug trafficking charges in Canada that date back to 2015, said Chris Leather, chief superintendent with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. "Those charges are very much unresolved," Leather said. (More drug trafficking stories.)