A former Olympic snowboarder who allegedly became the head of a billion-dollar drug trafficking organization has been charged with ordering the murder of a witness against him earlier this year, according to an indictment unsealed Wednesday by federal prosecutors in Los Angeles.
Authorities said Ryan Wedding, a Canadian who is on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list, issued an order to kill a witness in a 2024 federal narcotics case against him.
The order resulted in the victim being shot to death in a restaurant in Medellín, Colombia, in January 2025, prosecutors said.
Wedding, 44, is believed to be a fugitive in Mexico. He is charged in the nine-count indictment with overseeing the operations of a violent and lucrative criminal enterprise, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in L.A.
Authorities arrested 10 people Tuesday as part of an operation investigators dubbed “Giant Slalom.”
Those charged include Deepak Balwant Paradkar, 62, of Thornhill, Ontario, Canada. Paradkar allegedly advised Wedding to murder the victim to prevent Wedding’s extradition to the U.S. from Mexico on the 2024 charges against him.
Authorities described Gursewak Singh Bal, 31, of Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, as the co-founder and co-operator of a website called “The Dirty News,” described in the indictment as “an urban news outlet.”
Prosecutors charge that Bal agreed to not post about Wedding and instead allegedly posted a photo of the witness in Colombia so that they could be located and killed.
Edwin Basora-Hernandez, 31, a reggaeton musician and citizen of the Dominican Republic said to reside in Montreal, allegedly provided Wedding’s co-conspirators with the victim’s contact information, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in L.A.
According to the indictment, Wedding allegedly placed a multi-million dollar bounty on the witness — identified only as Victim A — who was later shot five times in the head while he was eating at a restaurant.
First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli called the killing “a cruel, cold-blooded act” in a news release Wednesday.
“This week’s arrests underscore our resolve to root out and punish the wrongdoers involved in this criminal organization and serve as a warning for drug lord Ryan Wedding: If convicted, you will never see the outside of a prison ever again,” Essayli said.
Prosecutors announced charges Wednesday against a number of other Canadians allegedly involved in the conspiracy. They include Atna Ohna, 40, of Laval, Québec; Allistair Chapman, 33, of Calgary; Ahmad Nabil Zitoun, 35, of Edmonton; and Rolan Sokolovski, 37, of Toronto.
Several Colombians were also charged. They were listed as Carmen Yelinet Valoyes Florez, 47, of Bogotá; Wilson Riascos, 45, from the city of Cali; and Yulieth Katherine Tejada, 36, described by authorities as a legal permanent resident from Colombia living in Orlando, Fla.
Wedding was previously charged in a 2024 indictment with running a continuing criminal enterprise, assorted drug trafficking charges and directing the murders of two members of a family in Canada in retaliation for a stolen drug shipment.
The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control on Wednesday also sanctioned Wedding, alongside nine individuals and nine entities closely associated with him.
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