10 ways ex-Olympian Ryan Wedding has evaded arrest for 10 years

Once a Team Canada Olympic snowboarder, Ryan James Wedding has spent more than 10 years on the run from authorities, while allegedly leading a murderous, transnational drug-smuggling empire. 

Listed as one of the FBI's ten most-wanted fugitives since March, the U.S. State Department is offering a $10-million US reward for information leading to his arrest. 

So, how has Wedding, 43, evaded capture for so long?

CBC News has spoken with current and former investigators and reviewed court files and public statements by authorities. What emerges is a multi-faceted strategy involving technology, money and high-level connections that appears to have allowed Wedding to consistently remain one step ahead of U.S. and Canadian authorities.

Born into a skiing family in Thunder Bay, Ont., Wedding later moved to Coquitlam, B.C., and appeared destined for a promising career in snowboarding, reaching the 2002 Olympic Games in Utah.

But he soon embarked on a much different career path.

Arrested in a sting operation after he flew to California to buy cocaine in June 2008, Wedding spent more than three years in U.S. prisons.

Sometime after his release, he moved to Montreal, where he was charged by the RCMP in April 2015 as part of a large-scale operation targeting cocaine imports to Canada. 

On the run since then, authorities say he relocated to Mexico and now sends mass shipments of fentanyl, cocaine and methamphetamine across North America.

Wedding's biggest asset may be his connections to Mexico's merciless drug cartels, which the U.S. and Canada consider terrorist organizations.

According to the FBI, Wedding may be living under the protection of the notorious Sinaloa cartel, once led by drug lord Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán.

"Wedding,