The lawyer for Ryan Wedding, the accused transnational drug lord who once was a Canadian Olympic athlete, says he is seeking U.S. court intervention over his mysterious and allegedly extrajudicial arrest.
Wedding, who was one of the FBI’s top ten wanted fugitives with a $15 million bounty for his arrest, was taken into custody last week in Mexico City and within hours was flown to California where he is accused of massive drug trafficking and conspiracy to commit murder, including orchestrating the successful hit on a cooperating witness who was testifying against him.
While Mexican authorities and the U.S. ambassador to Mexico both said that Wedding voluntarily surrendered, FBI Director Kash Patel trumpeted the role of the FBI’s elite, combat-trained Hostage Rescue Team in Wedding’s apprehension.
Wedding’s lawyer, Anthony E Colombo Jr. earlier
disputed the claim of a surrender
on Monday, telling reporters: “He didn’t surrender. He was apprehended. He was arrested. And so any spin that the government of Mexico is putting on this, that he surrendered, is inaccurate.”
On Thursday, Colombo told National Post the circumstances of the arrest will be challenged in court.
“The legality of Mr. Wedding’s arrest and the circumstances surrounding his apprehension will be subject to judicial review before the District Court,” Colombo said.
“With enforcement actions against Maduro and my client, Mr. Wedding, the Trump Administration has shown a bold new willingness to pursue fugitives beyond our borders, but bold action does not suspend due process.”
The FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team, HRT, was the same unit that earlier this month blitzed into a protected installation in Venezuela and grabbed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife and flew them back to the United States to face charges.
Colombo’s challenge comes after a
Wall Street Journal exclusive account
of a secret FBI bust that grabbed Wedding, countering the official government accounts of a voluntary surrender.
Attributing the information to Mexican and U.S. officials familiar with the operation, the Journal reports of a tense standoff and arrest.
“Law-enforcement officials made contact with Wedding — presumed to be armed and dangerous — and, in an intense negotiation, reminded him that his associates had been captured and millions of dollars of his assets had been seized, some of the officials said.”
The Journal says that Colombo confirmed that “FBI agents handcuffed Wedding, who was then transported to California.”
The information, if true and confirmed, will likely cause scandal for apparently being an extrajudicial apprehension and extradition.
There is no evidence Wedding had a court appearance before his removal or access to consular assistance with Canada’s diplomatic mission.
Global Affairs Canada (GAC) declined to provide any information on Wedding’s circumstances, citing “privacy considerations,” but said Canada’s diplomatic service was “ready to provide” assistance, which suggests such assistance was not previous provided.
“GAC is aware of a Canadian citizen who was arrested in Mexico and is now in custody in the United States. Canadian officials stand ready to provide consular assistance. GAC provides consular services to all Canadian citizens, including those detained abroad, in line with the Canadian Consular Services Charter,” Thida Ith, a media spokesperson with Global Affairs Canada told National Post.
The journal story alleges that the FBI’s hands-on involvement in Wedding’s capture “was intended to be a closely guarded secret.” That was spoiled by a series of social media posts by Patel which praised the FBI’s team in what he portrayed as a dangerous and dramatic incident.
“This was a zero-margin, high-risk operation,” Patel posted on Friday. “Our FBI HRT teams executed with precision, discipline, and total professionalism alongside our Mexican partners to bring Ryan James Wedding back to face justice.”
The arrest account in the Journal, by reporters Steve Fisher, Alexander Ward and Santiago Pérez, says that Wedding was under pressure in his Mexico hiding with Mexican security forces closing in on the former Olympic snowboarder.
He was losing support and protection from Mexico’s powerful Sinaloa Cartel and was running out of options when Mexico’s security officials and members of the FBI’s HRT caught up with him.
On Monday, Wedding pleaded not guilty to 17 felony counts in two indictments in California’s Central District federal court.
The fallout for Patel’s stirring praise was immediate in Mexico, where Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum has repeatedly been asked whether the U.S. conducted an operation on Mexican soil. That is a touchy issue in her country, which guards its sovereignty in the face of a powerful American influence. Foreign agents are not constitutionally allowed to participate operationally in Mexico.
Sheinbaum repeated her contention that Wedding surrendered at the embassy on Tuesday, but in answering questions from reporters she said her information is based on what the American authorities told her government.
“I’m not going to get into a debate with the FBI director, nor do I want there to be a conflict,” Sheinbaum said. “What they, the United States authorities, told the Mexican authorities is that it was a voluntary surrender. And that’s the same statement issued by the United States Embassy in Mexico.”
While Colombo declined to confirm for National Post that his allegation is that Wedding was hands-on apprehended by the FBI outside the confines of the U.S. embassy, he hinted at that prospect at his courthouse address with reporters.
“If the United States is unilaterally going into a sovereign country and apprehending somebody, you know, you can understand the concern that sovereign entity might have,” he said.
Wedding was born in Thunder Bay, Ont., and moved to Coquitlam, B.C., and then Montreal. He competed in the Salt Lake City Olympic Games in 2002, where he performed poorly.
His 24th place Olympic finish in the Men’s Parallel Giant Slalom gave the FBI their codename for the investigation: Operation Giant Slalom.
• Email: ahumphreys@postmedia.com | X: AD_Humphreys
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