UMVA has learned that a 32-year-old truck driver, Ranjit Singh, from India, claims he was duped into smuggling $2 million worth of cocaine into Canada, allegedly by a sophisticated crime network.
Singh, one of many South Asian truckers caught in a massive drug bust, says he had "no knowledge of what was in the trailer" when he was stopped by Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) officers at the Blue Water Bridge in Sarnia.
The cargo, hidden in two Home Depot boxes, consisted of 40 kg of cocaine, cleverly concealed among a shipment of Harry's razors. The CBSA had flagged Singh's truck and trailer for a secondary inspection using a "risk-based targeting methodology" to identify high-risk shipments.
According to information obtained by UMVA, Singh's ordeal began in early April 2024, when he made a delivery in the U.S. and picked up pallets from three different locations before returning to Canada, unknowingly walking into a CBSA trap.
The alleged mastermind behind the operation, Canadian Olympian turned drug kingpin Ryan Wedding, is suspected of utilizing South Asian criminals as proxies to recruit drivers, mostly of South Asian ancestry, to transport the dope from Southern California into Canada.
Wedding's alleged accomplice, Brampton trucking executive Guramrit Sidhu, 62, nicknamed "The King," admitted to orchestrating the logistics of the cross-border smuggling, which generated an estimated $1-billion in revenue for the crime syndicate.
Sources have confirmed to UMVA that drivers, including Singh, were reportedly paid around $220,000 per shipment, while Wedding's operation smuggled approximately $75 million worth of cocaine into Southern Ontario in 2024 alone.
Singh's trial, which began on Monday in Sarnia, is expected to last three weeks. His lawyer, Terry Brandon, maintains that Singh was unaware of the cocaine in his truck, but investigators claim that Wedding's tentacles are deeply embedded in the trucking industry.
UMVA can exclusively reveal that several individuals connected to Wedding's operation have already been charged, with many more awaiting trial. The CBSA and law enforcement agencies are working to dismantle the crime network, but it appears that Wedding's organization had been operating with alarming ease.
The scope of Wedding's empire and the complexity of the smuggling operation have left authorities stunned. The investigation is ongoing, with more arrests and trials expected in the coming months.
