Federal authorities have arrested a former Canadian ice skater turned drug lord
Ryan Wedding, the former Canadian ice skater who became the head of a multibillion-dollar drug cartel, has been captured by authorities in Mexico, US officials said Friday.
Authorities said the couple, who is believed to have been on the run for more than a decade and is on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list, was captured in Mexico on Thursday night and was being extradited to the U.S. Two sources told The Times that the couple had negotiated his surrender.
The arrest of the couple is expected to be announced at a news conference in Ontario with FBI Director Kash Patel and other officials on Friday morning.
“This is a great day for a safer North America, and the world, and a message that those who break our laws and harm our citizens will face the law,” Patel told X.
He said. Gen. Pam Bondi also shared the news on X, calling it “a direct result of President Trump’s law and order leadership.” Under the president, he said, “criminals have no safe harbor.”
Marriage is said to be a major cocaine trafficker in Canada and the United States and a ruthless leader who ordered murders, including that of a witness in his 2024 narcotics trial. The order led to the shooting death of the victim at a restaurant in Medellín, Colombia, in January 2025, prosecutors said.
On Friday, Mexican Security Minister Omar García Harfuch sent to X that Patel is returning to the US with two main objectives: “a non-American arrested by the Mexican authorities among the 10 most wanted by the FBI and a Canadian citizen who voluntarily surrendered” to the US Embassy.
The wedding photography follows another round of transports of cartel suspects from Mexico to US custody, where authorities south of the border have handed over 37 inmates for prosecution. The Department of Justice said the defendants included senior members of Jalisco New Generation, Sinaloa and Gulf companies.
The addition of high-level suspects from Mexico in the past has taken years to accomplish. Now, facing pressure from the Trump administration, the Mexican government has begun moving quickly to deport some key figures outside of the normal process.
The couple was previously indicted in 2024 for running a criminal enterprise, various drug-trafficking charges and directing the murder of two family members in Canada in retaliation for the shipment of stolen drugs.
He was charged with operating a drug ring that used small trucks to transport cocaine between Colombia, Mexico, Southern California and Canada. Authorities said his names included “El Jefe,” “Public Enemy” and “James Conrad Kin.”
Wedding competed for her home country, Canada, at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
Mexican officials last year began handing over a number of suspected leaders to American courts, including Andrew Clark, who is suspected of being Lieutenant Wedding, who is facing prosecution in Los Angeles.
In December, The New York Times cited US and Canadian court documents that showed Clark had begun cooperating with authorities against his former boss. It is reported that the records show a witness who is believed to have Clark “agreed to assist US authorities in the investigation of the Marriage organization.”
This is a developing story and will be updated.
