Ryan Wedding was captured in Mexico City and is now in U.S. federal custody as of Friday, January 23, 2026.
His arrest marks the end of a massive international manhunt for the former Canadian Olympic snowboarder, who had been on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list with a $15 million reward on his head.
The Details of the Capture:
Wedding was apprehended in Mexico City. Reports on the specific nature of his capture vary slightly: Mexico’s Security Minister, Omar García Harfuch, stated that Wedding surrendered voluntarily at the U.S. embassy on Wednesday, while U.S. officials described it as a high-risk operation involving international cooperation.
He was flown to the United States on Friday morning and is scheduled to make his first court appearance in Los Angeles on Monday, January 26.
FBI Director Kash Patel noted that Wedding's capture is the 500th arrest in the history of the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list.
Authorities allege Wedding underwent a dramatic transformation from an elite athlete (2002 Winter Olympics) to a "modern-day El Chapo."
He moved up to 60 metric tons of cocaine annually from Colombia through Mexico and into the U.S. and Canada.
He moved up to 60 metric tons of cocaine annually from Colombia through Mexico and into the U.S. and Canada.
The most serious charges involve his alleged orchestration of multiple murders. Specifically, he is accused of ordering the November 2023 killings of a couple in Ontario in a case of mistaken identity and the January 2024 assassination of a federal witness in Medellín, Colombia.
The "Dirty News" Link: Prosecutors claim Wedding used a Canadian website called The Dirty News to post a photo of the federal witness so his hitmen could identify and kill him.
