Los Angeles FBI seizes rare Mercedes in connection with alleged drug kingpin
-
Click here to listen to this article - Share via
See more from the L.A. Times in Google Search. Set us as preferred
FBI agents in Los Angeles have seized a rare Mercedes Roadster worth $13 million as part of their drug trafficking investigation into former Olympic snowboarder Ryan Wedding.
The car, a silver 2002 Mercedes CLK-GTR, is one of six of its kind ever made, according to Autoblog. Federal investigators believe the car may be connected to Wedding and his associates, who are accused of transporting cocaine from Mexico into the U.S. and Canada.
Earlier this month, prosecutors unsealed an indictment that accuses Wedding of ordering the killing of a witness who had planned to testify against him in a 2024 federal narcotics case.
The witness was shot and killed in a restaurant in Medellín, Colombia, in January, The Times reported.
Wedding is on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list for allegedly running a vast and lucrative criminal enterprise. The Canadian-born snowboarder competed in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, placing 24th in the men’s parallel giant slalom.
Ryan Wedding, a former snowboarder who represented Canada in the Olympics, has been charged with ordering the murder of a witness in the federal narcotics case against him.
“He chose to become a major drug trafficker and a killer,” said U.S. Atty. for the Central District of California Martin Estrada during a news conference last year.
Federal agents also announced the seizure of a website, TheDirtyNewz.com, a blog on Canadian gang crime operated by a co-defendant in the case who allegedly helped publicize a potential federal witness against the narcotics operation who was then later killed. Site owner Gursewak Singh Bal, 31, of Mississauga, Ontario, was among 11 defendants arrested this month.
The FBI recently raised the reward for turning in Wedding to $15 million. Investigators did not provide details on the role the two-door Mercedes may have played in Wedding’s crimes.
More From the Los Angeles Times
Podcasts
On screen, Errol Flynn played a series of daredevils, fortune hunters, and suave romantics. Off screen, he lived a life of outsize debauchery and recklessness, including a persistent interest in underage girls. In 1943, at the height of his fame, he faced trial in Los Angeles on charges of statutory rape.
In our first episode, the L.A. Times columnist George Skelton sizes up the governors he’s known, what made them successful and whether the next one can measure up.
How do you get more people to care about climate change — and tell riveting stories along the way? Boiling Point explored that question at a live event during this year’s New York City Climate Week at Columbia University’s Climate School.
