From Olympian to Alleged Drug Kingpin
Wedding, who went by several aliases—including “El Jefe,” “Giant” and “Public Enemy”—was first convicted of conspiracy to distribute cocaine in November 2009, according to the indictment obtained by A&E Crime + Investigation. He was released from a federal prison in Texas in December 2011 and was deported back to Canada, during which it’s believed he launched the Wedding Criminal Enterprise.
In April 2015, Wedding allegedly fled Canada when he learned the Royal Canadian Mountain Police were preparing to arrest him on drug trafficking charges. He relocated to Mexico, where he was purportedly running his billion-dollar drug-trafficking organization for over a decade under the safety of the Sinaloa drug cartel, per the indictment.
The former pro athlete and his associates, including alleged co-conspirator and second-in-command Andrew Clark, purportedly worked with Colombian and Mexican cartels to source cocaine from Colombia, deploy boats and planes to move hundreds of kilograms of product through Mexico and then use semi-trucks to smuggle cocaine across the U.S.-Mexico border, court documents say.
From there, the indictment reads, Wedding’s network allegedly used the Southern California cities of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino as hubs to store the narcotics before transporting and distributing it to Canada and other locations in the United States. Authorities alleged his operation trafficked 60 metric tons of cocaine per year and was Canada’s largest cocaine supplier.
Crime Boss Reportedly Ordered Multiple Murders
In addition to drug distribution and money laundering, Wedding is also suspected of sanctioning several murders that were allegedly driven by his efforts to “enrich members and associates of the Wedding Criminal Enterprise,” “establish control over the Canadian drug trade,” preserve and expand the organization’s power through violence and intimidation and retaliate against rivals or “individuals who had fallen out of favor,” including those believed to be cooperating with law enforcement, per the indictment.
According to federal prosecutors, Wedding ordered the 2023 execution of a family "in retaliation for a stolen drug shipment.” However, the hitman mistakenly attacked the wrong victims, killing a mother and father and critically injuring their adult daughter at her rental home in Ontario. Authorities believe Wedding may have been targeting the previous residents, Toronto Life reported.
Authorities suspect that in May 2024, Wedding contracted the killing of another person over a drug debt, and that in January 2025, he commissioned the slaying of former associate Jonathan Acebedo-Garcia, who was allegedly covertly working with federal law enforcement and had agreed to testify against him in court. Prosecutors said Acebedo-Garcia was at a Colombian restaurant when he was shot in the head five times by an assassin who was part of a group of conspirators being paid $500,000 by Wedding.
Akil Davis, the assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office, announced in March 2025 that Wedding had been added to the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list and offered $10 million for his capture. At the time, Wedding was wanted "for allegedly running a transnational drug trafficking network that routinely shipped hundreds of kilograms of cocaine from Colombia, through Mexico and Southern California, to Canada and other locations in the United States, and for orchestrating multiple murders and an attempted murder in furtherance of these drug crimes," the FBI stated.
The Arrest
It’s unclear how Wedding was brought into custody. While FBI Director Kash Patel purported on X that the “zero-margin, high-risk operation” was “executed with precision, discipline, and total professionalism” by the FBI Hostage Rescue Team, President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico claimed Wedding willingly surrendered, according to the Wall Street Journal.
During a January 2026 news conference announcing Wedding’s arrest, Patel described him as "the largest narco trafficker in modern times” and compared him to notorious drug lords Pablo Escobar and Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán.
“This individual and his organization in the Sinaloa cartel poured narcotics into the streets of North America and killed too many of our youth and corrupted too many of our citizens,” Patel said.
Wedding, who previously had a $15 million FBI bounty on his head, “tormented several people and several families that will never be the same,” Davis said.
“We seized mountains of drugs, cash, weapons. We seized a Mercedes-Benz estimated at over $15 million. We seized dozens of motorcycles worth approximately $40 million and other valuable artwork and jewelry,” he continued.
Thirty-six people have been arrested so far in connection with the case. The State Department announced it is offering a $2 million reward for information leading to further arrests.
Wedding faces life in federal prison if convicted of murder. He is due back in court February 2026.
