The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) introduced the arrest of Ryan Marriage ceremony on expenses of cocaine trafficking and homicide. Marriage ceremony allegedly ran a transnational drug trafficking operation that relied on cryptocurrency to maneuver and launder the proceeds.
The occasion marked the continuation of the more and more related function that digital property, and stablecoin funds, particularly, play in facilitating illicit finance.
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FBI Ends Decade-Lengthy Manhunt
In accordance with the FBI, authorities took Marriage ceremony, a 44-year-old former Canadian Olympic snowboarder, into custody on Thursday night time. The arrest marked a decade-long manhunt of one of many Division of Justice’s most needed fugitives.
Marriage ceremony reportedly turned himself in at the US embassy in Mexico Metropolis, revealed Mexican authorities.
The arrest stemmed from Marriage ceremony’s alleged function in a transnational drug trafficking operation below the wing of one among Mexico’s greatest legal organizations. Authorities additionally alleged Marriage ceremony operated below a number of pseudonyms, together with “El Jefe” and “Public Enemy.”
“He was allegedly working and taking part in a transnational drug trafficking operation that routinely shipped a whole lot of kilograms of cocaine from Colombia, by means of Mexico and Southern California to the US and Canada – as a member of the Sinaloa Cartel,” stated FBI Director Kash Patel in a social media submit.
In 2024, the FBI introduced a $15 million reward for info resulting in his seize.
Two months in the past, main prosecutor Invoice Essayli unveiled in a press convention that Marriage ceremony was additionally answerable for the homicide of a witness who was shot 5 instances within the head in a restaurant in Colombia final January.
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Authorities additionally highlighted that Marriage ceremony’s operations relied on cryptocurrencies to launder cash and transfer proceeds throughout borders.
USDT Wallets Used to Obscure Proceeds
In accordance with the indictment, Marriage ceremony’s enterprise would conceal a major quantity of the earnings made by means of cocaine gross sales utilizing US and Canadian {dollars}, in addition to cryptocurrencies.
Authorities argued that the enterprise relied on a complicated Tether-based system to take action.
The scheme concerned splitting giant sums into smaller transactions. These funds had been then routed by means of a number of middleman USDT wallets earlier than converging in a central Tether pockets allegedly managed by Marriage ceremony.
The indictment additionally revealed that in November 2024, one other defendant obtained round 2 million Colombian pesos to advance operations. The pesos had allegedly been transformed from cryptocurrency as fee for roughly 300 kilograms of cocaine.
Marriage ceremony’s case is only one of a number of others which have surfaced lately. Earlier this month, the DOJ charged a Venezuelan nationwide for allegedly utilizing crypto in a $1 billion cash laundering scheme.
In the meantime, cryptocurrency crime reached an all-time excessive in 2025.
In accordance with blockchain evaluation agency Chainalysis, illicit addresses obtained a minimum of $154 billion final yr, representing a 162% enhance from 2024.