Ex-Olympian who used crypto to traffic cocaine added to FBI’s Most Wanted list

5 months ago 31

An ex-Olympian utilized USDT stablecoin successful a cocaine trafficking network.
The FBI is offering a $10 cardinal bounty and added him to its Most Wanted list.

Former Olympic snowboarder Ryan Wedding has been added to the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives database for moving a transnational cocaine trafficking web that utilized stablecoins similar Tether for payments.

The US Department of State is offering up to $10 cardinal for accusation starring to his arrest.

Wedding allegedly oversaw a transgression endeavor that smuggled hundreds of kilograms of cocaine from Colombia done Mexico and California into Canada.

Court filings uncover helium utilized encrypted messaging apps and stablecoins to negociate cause transactions, with 1 tracked USDT payment of $17,300 linked to a deal.

“Wedding went from shredding pulverization connected the slopes astatine the Olympics to distributing pulverization cocaine connected the streets,” said Akil Davis, Assistant Director successful Charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office. “Wedding is simply a precise unsafe man.”

Beyond cause trafficking, authorities impeach Wedding of orchestrating aggregate murders, including a retaliatory treble homicide successful Ontario successful 2023.

His second-in-command, Andrew Clark, was arrested successful Mexico past October and extradited to the US, but Wedding remains astatine large, perchance hiding successful Mexico oregon Central America.

“The erstwhile Canadian snowboarder unleashed an avalanche of decease and destruction,” said Matthew Allen, Special Agent successful Charge of the DEA’s Los Angeles Field Division. “He earned the sanction ‘El Jefe,’ becoming brag of a convulsive transnational cause trafficking organization.”

If convicted, Wedding faces beingness successful prison.

His lawsuit highlights the expanding relation of crypto successful organized crime, with USDT often utilized successful illicit transactions.

According to Tether’s ain claims, it has worked with instrumentality enforcement to frost implicit $1.8 billion successful illicit funds arsenic of October 2024.