FBI Director Kash Patel described Canadian former snowboarder Ryan Marriage ceremony as a ‘modern-day iteration of Pablo Escobar’.
The US State Division has raised its reward for info resulting in the arrest of a former Olympic snowboarder turned alleged drug kingpin, as Canadian authorities introduced seven individuals linked to the fugitive have been arrested.
Talking at a information convention in Washington on Wednesday, FBI Director Kash Patel described Ryan Marriage ceremony as a “modern-day iteration of Pablo Escobar” – referring to the infamous Colombian drug lord who died in 1993.
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The 44-year-old, who’s on the FBI’s “Ten Most Needed Fugitives” checklist, is believed to be hiding out in Mexico. Patel mentioned the reward for info resulting in Marriage ceremony’s arrest now stands at $15m, rising from $10m.
“[Wedding] is liable for engineering a narco-trafficking and narco-terrorism programme that now we have not seen in a very long time,” Patel mentioned.
Marriage ceremony, who was indicted in 2024 for conspiracy to distribute and possess cocaine, conspiracy to export cocaine and conspiracy to commit homicide, is “extraordinarily harmful”, mentioned FBI agent Akil Davis.
Davis added that Marriage ceremony, who represented Canada in snowboarding on the 2002 Salt Lake Metropolis Olympics, ending twenty fourth within the parallel big slalom, is “extraordinarily violent” and “extraordinarily rich”.
At Wednesday’s information convention, Lawyer Common Pam Bondi mentioned Marriage ceremony is Canada’s largest cocaine distributor and is behind the trafficking of $1bn value of medication every year.
Bondi mentioned Marriage ceremony works carefully with Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel, transporting about 60 metric tonnes of cocaine yearly into Los Angeles in vehicles throughout the southern border.
“We’ll discover you, and you can be accountable and held to justice to your crimes,” Bondi mentioned.
“It’s [drugs] killing our children. It’s killing our mates. It’s killing our family. And this man is liable for an incredible quantity of that horror,” she added.
On Tuesday, Canadian officers arrested seven individuals in reference to Marriage ceremony’s cocaine-smuggling operation, together with his lawyer Deepak Paradkar, as a part of a coordinated interagency effort by Canada and the US dubbed “Operation Big Slalom”.
Assistant US Lawyer Invoice Essayli mentioned the 62-year-old lawyer suggested Marriage ceremony that if he killed a witness in a pending legal case, “the case can be dismissed”.
The witness in query was then murdered after being shot 5 occasions within the head in January 2025 at a restaurant in Medellin, Colombia.
“Marriage ceremony positioned a bounty on the sufferer’s head within the inaccurate perception that the sufferer’s dying would end result within the dismissal of legal costs in opposition to him and his worldwide drug-trafficking ring and would additional make sure that he was not extradited to the US,” Essayli mentioned.
“He was mistaken,” he added.
Bondi mentioned US authorities are providing a $2m reward for info resulting in the arrest of these concerned within the Medellin killing.
A second man arrested this week by Canadian authorities, named Gursewak Singh Bal, is the founding father of a pretend information web site often known as The Soiled Information.
Bal was allegedly paid to submit {a photograph} of the witness and his spouse on his web site previous to the homicide so that they could possibly be “situated and killed”, in keeping with the Justice Division.
US authorities at the moment are searching for the extradition of all seven individuals arrested in Canada, whereas three others linked to the Medellin homicide had been taken into custody within the US.
Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Michael Duheme, mentioned Marriage ceremony stays “one of many high threats to Canadian public security”.
As a part of Operation Big Slalom, the Treasury Division additionally introduced that its Workplace of International Asset Management is imposing monetary sanctions on Marriage ceremony and his community.
