True Patriot Love - August 07, 2026


Canada’s Organized Crime Problem Is Bigger Than You Think ft. Kim Bolan


Episode Stats


Length

36 minutes

Words per minute

175.74

Word count

6,425

Sentence count

255

Harmful content

Hate speech

5

sentences flagged


Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
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00:00:29.000 priority. Shop now at lesslethal.ca. Kim Ball, we know you from the Vancouver Sun and also
00:00:38.400 being one of the most hawkish eyes on organized crime I think Canada has,
00:00:45.620 especially at a time where it seems to be the Wild West in Canada. So thanks for taking the
00:00:51.500 time to do this. My pleasure. Thanks for having me on. You know what's so funny is as you and I
00:00:56.680 get talking we get right to the heart of the matter but when we started our conversation
00:01:01.080 earlier one of the things that we talked about was the the fading of investigative journalism
00:01:08.040 overall when really we see how important it is through work like you do because sometimes it's
00:01:14.780 so revealing the big picture becomes so revealing to how important this can be how do you end up
00:01:21.560 in journalism getting to where you are right now because it's a very specified very passion driven
00:01:28.820 career you've cut out for yourself yes well I mean I started many decades ago 42 years I've
00:01:35.160 been at my newspaper it's a newspaper I delivered when I was a child on Vancouver Island so I grew
00:01:40.220 up on the island you know it was the era of Watergate and you were like wow you know these
00:01:45.540 people do this job and they bring down a president like even as a teenager that was very impressive
00:01:50.340 to me, right? So I always, I worked on papers when I was in high school. I worked on papers when I
00:01:56.220 was in university. I did a master's degree in journalism and I got hired at the Vancouver Sun
00:02:01.400 coming right off my master's degree. I have been there ever since. That is a really remarkable
00:02:07.600 thing in media. I will say as a media guy who's bounced a little bit, which does happen. But I
00:02:13.380 think that speaks to how you so quickly became ingrained in the discussion and understanding
00:02:20.040 the fabric of the Vancouver story so was it crime right away for you no it's an interesting back
00:02:28.660 story you know again I was a rookie reporter back then there were lots of media jobs but you still
00:02:34.540 didn't get hired into a full-time union job right away you know you worked on a temporary contract
00:02:39.040 for a year or sometimes two years right so you always were trying to distinguish yourself one
00:02:43.880 way or another. And so this was 1984. Throughout that year, we had upheaval here and in other
00:02:51.600 parts of Canada because of events in India. The Golden Temple had been attacked by Indira
00:02:56.360 Gandhi. She was trying to get rid of a small group of militants. But in fact, you know,
00:03:02.040 many more pilgrims were killed. It became a huge issue around the world for people of
00:03:06.020 the Sikh religion who were very angry and frustrated. She ended up being assassinated
00:03:11.940 in October of 1984, again, more events around the world were impacted by what happened there.
00:03:19.880 And here in BC, we had on June 23rd, 1985, the Air India bombing, which remains Canada's most
00:03:27.740 devastating terrorist attack. And it's a story I have covered since that very night.
00:03:32.000 That's quite a story for a rookie, a new rookie.
00:03:35.260 I was one of many journalists on the story, but I kind of stuck with it, right? And I went to India
00:03:39.840 first on my own and later on assignment to learn more about the backstory of what had happened.
00:03:45.300 And if anything, I guess my curiosity that probably has fueled my career, curiosity and
00:03:52.720 stubbornness has fueled my career. You know, I'm like wanting to know as much as I can about an
00:03:58.240 issue. So I, again, have now traveled to India several times and have traveled to the UK on
00:04:04.000 that story. I've been to Ireland, which of course has commemorated our victims because the Air
00:04:08.780 India plane went down off the coast of Ireland I was just there in June so I'm
00:04:13.160 an accidental crime reporter you know if air India hadn't happened I'm not sure 0.82
00:04:17.420 I would have ended up being a crime reporter maybe I would have been more
00:04:20.180 interested in politics but you cannot get a story more impactful than that one
00:04:26.540 and it has in fact not just changed the trajectory of my journalism career but
00:04:31.540 really of my life you know I have bonds with air India families that I will
00:04:36.920 maintain until I die. Some of them have died because a lot of time has passed. And then it's 1.00
00:04:41.600 a story with sort of layer after layer, the fact that the bombing happened in the first place when
00:04:47.480 there were many warning signs, the fact that people that were being targeted within the Sikh
00:04:53.000 community for speaking out against extremism, people like Ujul Dosan, she was beaten within
00:04:57.700 inches of his life in February of 85 before the bombing, actually wrote to then Prime Minister
00:05:05.120 Brian Mulroney and said if something isn't done I fear something catastrophic will happen. That was before the Air India bombing, right?
00:05:12.880 So, you know, unfortunately, it's a story that's still not resolved. There were charges that came eventually
00:05:18.660 a colleague of mine, Tara Singh, a journalist who dug into this who I quoted frequently was assassinated
00:05:24.720 before the charges were laid. He was going to be a witness in the case, which he had told me
00:05:29.620 just shortly before he ended up being killed.
00:05:32.700 Him and I shared a lot of threats together
00:05:34.560 because I was really going hard investigating
00:05:37.380 sort of the backstory of the suspects
00:05:39.520 before they were charged.
00:05:41.820 And, you know, then we had a trial
00:05:43.640 and there were acquittals,
00:05:44.660 even though, you know,
00:05:46.000 I believe that the right people were charged.
00:05:48.800 And one man, of course, injured at Reyat,
00:05:50.660 pleaded guilty.
00:05:51.340 He's now out of jail.
00:05:52.880 You know, so there was then a public inquiry.
00:05:55.340 Some of the recommendations
00:05:56.840 have still not been implemented.
00:05:58.420 So you have this ongoing frustration of victims' families over decades.
00:06:04.260 When you follow a story, when you really engage in a story, I think it's probably hard to let go.
00:06:10.380 I had a scenario about a decade, maybe a little bit longer.
00:06:15.780 I had a client that came to Toronto at the time I was making commercials for television.
00:06:23.900 And he got picked up by the FBI for having murdered his business partner some months before.
00:06:30.660 But as he was coming to see us in Toronto, his real mission was to escape.
00:06:35.660 And that story, I must think about it, a couple of times a month anyway, over a decade later.
00:06:42.180 And it was fairly insignificant by comparison.
00:06:45.420 But I can imagine that there are some of these stories.
00:06:48.420 And certainly, you focused on organized crime in some of the most investigative, deep, deep investigative ways that I've ever seen.
00:06:58.640 I don't know how you let go of those stories, frankly.
00:07:01.460 Well, I think you have a responsibility not to, as long as you're still a working journalist, because you have that historic knowledge.
00:07:07.100 And we were talking about, you know, the lack of investigative reporting.
00:07:10.680 It's because there are so many fewer media outlets and journalists, right?
00:07:14.400 And it takes resources.
00:07:15.780 It takes time.
00:07:16.760 It takes effort.
00:07:18.440 To your point, the Air India thing, at the time, I was in radio school.
00:07:24.500 Yes, there is school for radio, oddly.
00:07:27.740 But I remember how many angles and how much coverage was dedicated to that at the time.
00:07:34.620 Those resources are no longer there.
00:07:36.980 Yeah, I would argue that there wasn't enough dedicated.
00:07:41.160 It was one of those things that sporadically, people would look at it,
00:07:44.900 coming up to an anniversary or something like that.
00:07:47.920 But in the 15 years from the time of the bombing
00:07:50.640 to when charges were actually late,
00:07:52.900 there wasn't anywhere near the media attention
00:07:54.840 that there should have been, in my opinion.
00:07:56.920 And it was our local story.
00:07:58.320 The suspects were in our community, right?
00:08:00.740 And they were people we knew.
00:08:01.920 I've interviewed the suspects before they were charged
00:08:04.300 more than once, right?
00:08:05.540 So anyway, that kind of set me up.
00:08:09.500 Then I understood the judicial system.
00:08:11.980 It was often covering court cases.
00:08:13.860 I covered related cases, I had the police contacts, you know, I had community contacts
00:08:19.860 and sources. So it kind of morphed into organized crime and gang coverage,
00:08:25.140 again, because there was another big problem in our community with gang violence. And I always
00:08:29.620 want to get to the root cause of things, right? Nothing's black and white in the media. And
00:08:34.260 too often, again, because journalists are often short on time and resources,
00:08:40.420 is they take a more black and white version of a story.
00:08:43.980 One side says this, the other side says this.
00:08:46.140 And as we know, as old timers in this industry,
00:08:49.760 the stories are usually very gray.
00:08:51.620 Yeah, somewhere in the middle is something needs unraveled,
00:08:54.760 which is the art form, actually, that we watch you executing.
00:08:59.240 So now, thanks for the background on that.
00:09:01.960 That's my long background story on why I'm where I'm at.
00:09:05.120 Oh, that was fun for you.
00:09:05.780 I've written a book on Air India, too, right, called Loss of Faith.
00:09:08.620 You'll find that in the description for the show, so people can look that up.
00:09:14.980 So establishing that, and we'll come to it at the end of this discussion, because you got to participate in something that became very important, not just for your publisher, but also for our country.
00:09:30.060 And you were set off on a journey, but we'll talk a little bit about that.
00:09:33.760 Before we do, where are we right now in your estimation?
00:09:38.820 Recently, I've been following stuff you're writing on the base scope of organized crime in Canada
00:09:45.860 and how integrated it has become, how big a player we are.
00:09:51.340 And, you know, maybe you could just give us sort of a set of the stage for that,
00:09:55.240 because I don't think Canadians, by and large, realize where we are globally in this issue.
00:10:00.840 Yeah, we certainly do have a problem.
00:10:02.980 It's a problem that's gone on for decades and has been largely unaddressed, aside from individual investigations that maybe knock off a few players at the time, right?
00:10:12.020 But we have a number of criminal networks.
00:10:15.580 They often involve more than one criminal organization and many, many players.
00:10:21.160 And they are operating at the international level, at some of the highest levels of organized crime.
00:10:26.860 Now, describe that to me.
00:10:28.620 Well, you know, now it's all about networks, right?
00:10:31.260 I think we've all watched so many crime movies and crime shows that we're like, oh, you know, who's the godfather?
00:10:37.520 Who's that guy?
00:10:38.620 And in fact, we recently saw all the coverage of Ryan Wedding, you know, as this supposed kingpin.
00:10:45.060 Clearly, he was a very big player.
00:10:47.160 I first wrote about him in 2008 when no one knew who he was, by the way.
00:10:51.860 That is true.
00:10:53.100 I stoked that when I was getting ready for this interview.
00:10:55.440 I thought, oh, look who's trying to talk about this.
00:10:57.620 He was very angry with me at the time, right, and really minimized his involvement, and now look at the charges he is facing.
00:11:04.200 However, if you talk to people in the know, including, you know, a fellow that I interviewed who's a former cocaine trafficker in the U.S. for Sinaloa,
00:11:14.440 they think that he has been largely exaggerated as a figure and character.
00:11:18.740 It's not like suddenly cocaine stopped moving the day Ryan Wedding was arrested or indicted, right?
00:11:24.420 Well, it sure feels like he arrived to Canada, rolled over, and gave every name he could, to be honest with you.
00:11:29.180 But maybe I'm wrong.
00:11:30.160 No.
00:11:30.760 And he's in the U.S.
00:11:31.940 But anyway.
00:11:32.520 Sorry.
00:11:32.940 Yeah.
00:11:33.760 But so I guess, like, that's almost the cartoon caricature of organized crime that, you know, there's a Tony Soprano here and a Ryan wedding there, you know, and someone like El Chapo, you know, who's become mythological, despite the fact there are many, many other players.
00:11:51.280 These are often looser networks than that.
00:11:54.020 And they're networks that will take advantage of anyone who can do the job for them, right?
00:11:59.000 So if you have, you know, cocaine in Mexico and you want to move it to different places, you decide who are the best people to help with that.
00:12:08.780 So you have trucking networks.
00:12:10.040 We've heard a lot about the trucking networks.
00:12:11.800 Well, you know, you look at the South Asian community in Canada.
00:12:14.800 They're predominantly working in the trucking industry.
00:12:17.500 That doesn't mean all of them are involved.
00:12:19.420 But, you know, if you have a rest, there are largely going to be people from that community.
00:12:23.000 Right.
00:12:23.240 But they're not the kingpins, right?
00:12:25.260 No.
00:12:25.560 You have people that are brokering those deals, people in Canada who are often big players and are operating at the international level who will be making those calls, right?
00:12:35.540 So it's all about networks.
00:12:36.820 And when you examine some of the documents often related to U.S. cases and prosecutions, but sometimes prosecutions in Australia and other parts of the world, you see, oh, that surprises me.
00:12:51.500 That guy was working with that guy?
00:12:53.240 Right, right? Because, you know, you wouldn't have guessed that. Oh, they're rivals. But in fact, people will work with whoever can get the job done because it's all about making money. So we have some Canadian kingpins who were experts in manufacturing.
00:13:11.420 You look at, say, Chai Lopp, currently serving a sentence in Australia.
00:13:15.040 You know, he was first identified by another Canadian who is a senior leader at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime as the Asian El Chapo, right?
00:13:25.920 Because he was manufacturing so much methamphetamine in the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia that his group, the Sam Gore Network, was bringing in $8 billion a year.
00:13:37.720 that's a larger than the you know income or gross national product of countries right yeah and um
00:13:45.080 he's the canadian right he's a canadian that uh you know came as an adult from china young adult
00:13:50.600 you know had businesses in uh ontario ended up getting involved in the drug trade as a young man
00:13:57.000 working with the mafia right he ended up serving some time in the united states uh because and
00:14:03.080 At the time, the mafia didn't work generally with Asian organized crime, but he had a service that he offered, you know, and they agreed to work with him and he ended up doing time.
00:14:13.880 What often happens, too, is this networking improves once they've served time in a foreign jurisdiction, because, of course, then you're exposed to a whole broader network of people.
00:14:24.420 So I'm sure some people go to jail, you know, have huge regrets about their choices and never do anything about it again.
00:14:30.480 But then there are others who essentially capitalize.
00:14:31.880 They actually essentially become like bigger players because they've got those connections and they use them when they get out.
00:14:38.500 So sort of getting back to this, we have people involved in those networks.
00:14:43.860 Usually the network or almost, you know, naturally the network doesn't exclusively exist within Canada, right?
00:14:49.920 You know, so again, when you have something like Donald Trump last year talking about, oh my God, you know, Canadian fentanyls, you know, going across the border, some is, right?
00:15:00.320 but there's a lot more coming the other way and also fentanyl's you know no I don't know a single
00:15:05.560 criminal organization that deals in one product no it seems like you that you deal in all products
00:15:11.680 you have to diversify it's a criminal network you want to make money so you would imagine that if
00:15:16.680 you know one drug trade and you can tell me I mean this is my imagination but you can imagine
00:15:22.400 that if you have one drug trade once methamphetamine for example you have to put that
00:15:29.260 into a chain of distribution that has many different offerings or criminal connections
00:15:36.880 and tentacles to get it out there. There's no way otherwise to do it, I would imagine.
00:15:40.860 And it's all about, you know, you often hear people saying, well, you know, why would drug
00:15:45.560 traffickers want to kill their clients? Because then they're not going to have any clients.
00:15:49.320 I've said that, actually. I've gone and said that a lot.
00:15:51.980 Well, that's not the intention, right? It happens, but it's not the intention, right?
00:15:56.980 And so they're always looking for new chemical compounds to manufacture synthetic drugs.
00:16:02.420 But what we've also seen in Canada is the explosion of synthetic drugs, both manufacturing and importation.
00:16:08.100 And that's where all these precursor chemicals have become such an issue.
00:16:11.540 There are many fewer regulations on precursor chemicals in Canada than in the United States, for example.
00:16:17.500 And that's largely because they're used in legitimate business and industry as well.
00:16:21.920 But many people believe there should be greater regulation of them.
00:16:26.980 Another problem, and I did do this research project two years ago.
00:16:31.620 It resulted in this series in the Vancouver Sun and other post-making papers.
00:16:35.300 Well, let's talk about that for a second.
00:16:36.840 This was an appointment.
00:16:39.760 Somebody thought, oh, this is definitely something that we need to look at and put it into your hands.
00:16:45.920 Describe this.
00:16:47.380 Yeah, we have a very generous fellowship offered by the Lieutenant Governor's Office here in B.C.
00:16:53.240 so journals can go and spend longer on a project
00:16:55.860 and do the kind of research that we don't have time to do in our daily jobs.
00:16:59.600 So for me, it was a wonderful experience.
00:17:01.700 I pitched doing something on the international tentacles
00:17:04.540 of organized criminals from my province.
00:17:07.640 And I got to go to Australia, New Zealand,
00:17:11.040 which are markets for our methamphetamine,
00:17:13.580 and also to Fiji and Southeast Asia, including Vietnam, Thailand.
00:17:19.380 So this translated into a series of articles that are out there now, and you mentioned that they're not behind a paywall.
00:17:28.360 No, no paywall.
00:17:29.420 So, you know, and we also talked about how earlier how paywall is not a bad thing.
00:17:34.180 Get in on a paywall.
00:17:35.420 We put some cool stuff behind there, but that's not the case for this.
00:17:38.280 I'll make sure you get the link.
00:17:39.180 Yeah, yeah, support local journalism wherever you can.
00:17:41.420 Please.
00:17:42.400 So what did you discover?
00:17:44.160 What were the key takeaways?
00:17:45.280 Well, it's funny, right?
00:17:46.780 Like, you do these pitches, you know, to apply for a fellowship,
00:17:50.500 and they're obviously naturally speculative, right?
00:17:53.420 You haven't done the research yet, so you've got an idea,
00:17:55.760 you've got a little bit to support it, you've talked to a few people,
00:17:58.380 you know, so I'm like, yeah, I think this is something.
00:18:01.120 You're also a bit panicked when you get the fellowship.
00:18:03.080 Maybe it's nothing.
00:18:04.140 You know, you have to go do the work then, right?
00:18:06.340 And you're like, who's going to talk to me in Australia and New Zealand?
00:18:09.180 They don't know me.
00:18:10.140 Some people here know me.
00:18:11.340 I can at least get some interviews, right?
00:18:13.100 So I set some things up, and I hit it off,
00:18:15.620 And honestly, it was so educational for me, even as someone who knew quite a bit about transnational organized crime, you know, to just see how expansive these networks are.
00:18:26.040 We've had this essentially almost 25-year-old gang war here in B.C. that's literally resulted in hundreds of deaths, right?
00:18:34.700 So I've seen that up close on the ground, and I know the groups that are fighting with each other, and, you know, it's almost like you can keep track of who's ahead in terms of the bodies.
00:18:43.720 um when i went to australia and met with senior members of australian federal police you know
00:18:51.100 they gave me the results of some of these transnational investigations they have done
00:18:55.260 and been very successful with and they said oh we intercepted this guy who's with the wolfpack
00:19:00.200 gang alliance in prison in manila and even though he's in prison serving life for drug trafficking
00:19:05.720 he's from bc of course uh he uh is working with members of the united nations gang to continue
00:19:13.200 to get shipments into Australia of methamphetamines
00:19:17.920 so he can continue to make money while he's behind bars.
00:19:20.380 And I said to the guy, we're at a table just like this,
00:19:24.000 no, no, no, he's with the Wolfpack.
00:19:26.020 You know, it's me, the expert from BC, right?
00:19:28.560 You know, oh, they don't get along with the United Nations gang.
00:19:32.040 Like, they're enemies.
00:19:33.080 This guy was in a vehicle that was shot up in Kelowna,
00:19:35.600 resulting in the death of one of the Bacon brothers.
00:19:37.940 He would not, Kim, you know, we have intercepts,
00:19:41.960 Intercepted Communications, where he is communicating with United Nations rival gang members.
00:19:48.180 So what they explained to me and what I then learned from many other people that I interviewed during my two months of research
00:19:54.660 was that these guys, to make money at the international level, which is, of course, the most lucrative,
00:20:02.080 they will work with their enemies.
00:20:03.960 They will work with anyone, right?
00:20:05.660 So, again, getting back to where we started, you know, what's this about?
00:20:10.100 Who's in charge?
00:20:11.960 Anyone's in charge who can offer a service on any given day.
00:20:15.840 And it might be someone who was shooting at you 10 years ago in Vancouver.
00:20:20.540 Honour Among Thieves is dissipating as the upper echelon networks harder to get what they want.
00:20:27.300 No, exactly, exactly.
00:20:28.600 They're all operating internationally.
00:20:31.580 And, you know, there are obviously, you know, criminal organizations across Canada.
00:20:37.000 They network with each other.
00:20:38.820 Some of them have moved overseas.
00:20:40.720 and that has helped facilitate their operations but it's also helped them
00:20:47.280 avoid prosecution when they are suspects and murders here and it's also saved
00:20:53.740 some of their lives because some of them have been shot more than once here in
00:20:57.460 our gang war and when they go overseas they think they've got some level of
00:21:02.560 protection although we've also seen our gang war spill over into other countries
00:21:07.120 and just keep where you know i wrote well we see that happen here yeah yeah right no exactly it's
00:21:12.400 kind of shocking you know we had uh the case of jimmy sandhu grew up in bc uh but never nobody in
00:21:19.520 his family got him citizenship and you know he's a product of our school system i actually have
00:21:24.560 some mixed feelings about that he got involved as a young kid in crime gangs he was aligned with the
00:21:30.480 United Nations gang, got deported in 2016 to India, immediately got involved in manufacturing
00:21:38.160 ketamine. He had opened a ketamine factory, was living in Southeast Asia, sometimes in Dubai,
00:21:44.400 kept his networks alive and was, you know, in Phuket in Thailand at a beachfront villa
00:21:50.560 and was murdered, right? And it ended up being two hitmen sent by the wolf pack from Canada
00:21:56.720 to kill him there and they were both ex-canadian military which was quite disturbing oh that's a
00:22:02.640 disturbing yeah it was very disturbing right one of them's now serving life in in thailand for that
00:22:08.160 murder and the other one died in a plane crash when he was trying to flee it's interesting
00:22:13.360 recently you were writing about how uh the bike gangs uh hell's angels primarily i guess are the
00:22:20.800 mainstay here in BC. Now they've got a rival gang. Do you suspect the rival gang and the Hells Angels
00:22:29.460 have an upper echelon that's already working together, or are they really rivals at this
00:22:34.480 moment? Here in BC, in this province, they're rivals. See, that seems to be what happens. The
00:22:39.160 rivals happen here in Canada. Meanwhile, the upper echelon are the real kingpins that control
00:22:46.100 various elements of organized crime they're not fighting with each other i mean they're rivals
00:22:51.780 on paper fortunately we haven't seen any skirmishes yet but you know the fact that it's the outlaws
00:22:59.300 and the rebels both have a presence here in bc now uh it suggests that they think that
00:23:07.540 the hell's angels are perhaps not as strong as they once were in this province so that's really
00:23:11.780 interesting now having said that uh my law enforcement sources are telling me that all
00:23:16.980 three of those biker gangs are expanding right and the thing with biker gangs a lot of people think
00:23:23.140 ah you know it's just those guys they like riding their motorcycles you know people have more you
00:23:27.860 know in canada i think there's some that still have somewhat of a soft spot for these guys they
00:23:32.500 don't they don't think of them as organized criminals when in fact they have international
00:23:37.620 networks that pre-existed some of these other transnational crime groups right and that you
00:23:42.820 look on their web pages you know and they're like oh we're expanding here we're expanding there
00:23:48.260 and i you know i guess i do a lot of online research as well and i go through all their
00:23:54.100 pages and i'm like oh wow this is interesting you know in the philippines here is some vancouver
00:23:59.940 guys with their patches at an event you know because they always love to pose for photos
00:24:04.900 They do seem to love that.
00:24:06.060 So then I'm like, well, this is an interesting development,
00:24:08.700 right?
00:24:09.000 And then I'm like, well, of course
00:24:10.060 they want to establish some Canadians there. 0.87
00:24:13.460 We know there are Canadian Hells Angels 0.99
00:24:15.400 who've moved to Mexico so that, again,
00:24:17.560 they have more direct access to the drugs.
00:24:19.660 So you don't have to physically be in these other places
00:24:23.140 for these networks to exist.
00:24:25.560 Most of it's done on devices, WhatsApp, Signal.
00:24:29.400 I had someone who's deeply involved
00:24:33.360 suggest to me recently that police they thought had you know infiltrated signal which i don't
00:24:39.600 think is true but there's a level of paranoia there that maybe this you know encrypted app
00:24:45.920 is no longer the one we should use and you know there have been some great investigations i
00:24:50.560 mentioned australian federal police uh they do some incredible international investigations to
00:24:56.800 to you know tackle big players in organized crime including canadians right well okay so now you
00:25:04.320 you've painted a picture for me certainly on the west coast and in bc where and i want to attach
00:25:10.880 to something else about uh the foreign ownership uh legislation that just changed again they're
00:25:17.360 going to be opening up to foreign investment here in canada which i think fueled a lot of the wild
00:25:23.680 west here in in vancouver or were given that impression do you know what i mean yeah i maybe
00:25:31.920 have a slightly different take on it right i do think there's been a lot of looseness with regard
00:25:36.080 to all kinds of legislation and we've seen this you know issue with the gishnoi gang you know
00:25:41.200 that sent all kinds of young foot soldiers mostly from very impoverished families to count out on 0.99
00:25:46.560 student visas to do their bidding but most of those kids are either now behind bars many of
00:25:52.320 are behind bars now how many kids did they actually have out there did they estimate
00:25:56.480 probably hundreds that's what it's you know it seems like hundreds i haven't seen a specific
00:26:00.800 number right and certainly i also know of situations where international students came
00:26:06.720 here to study very legitimately and were broke because the cost of living is much higher they're
00:26:13.200 paying three times the tuition that you know in-house students their family spent everything
00:26:17.760 and they don't have so and it's how do you go home work and believe me especially in my city
00:26:24.400 in my province it's very easy to get involved in the drug trade on a low level and make some money
00:26:29.920 so there's different ways people are recruited right kim you blew my mind earlier uh just before
00:26:34.960 we we hit record you mentioned uh that we entered this international crime ring or this international
00:26:43.760 organized crime scenario with good old bc bud tell me about that well i mean that's certainly
00:26:52.320 how our networks uh you know made international connections right but i mean we are port city
00:26:59.840 in bc and people that don't know the vibe in bc like it's always been more lax towards drugs right
00:27:08.640 i would say right up until fentanyl you know there was more tolerance here for drugs party
00:27:13.200 drugs you know cocaine and pot was nothing yeah nobody you know if you knew someone like
00:27:20.400 that smoked pot before it was legalized like that was just normal right like it just there was not
00:27:26.160 any big concern about that issue uh so for a variety of reasons uh but again largely our
00:27:34.080 proximity to the us most of the province is empty and um you know we have been entrepreneurs at the
00:27:41.920 forefront of the drug trade and people became so successful at growing uh bc bud as it was known
00:27:49.840 it was recognized around the world right and again because the border was very very porous
00:27:55.840 guys that probably didn't plan on becoming transnational organized criminals but wanted
00:28:01.120 to move a little weed to make some money were crossing the border uh some like it was infamous
00:28:07.760 the hockey bag carriers right i mean i've had people show me the trails that they used so you
00:28:12.800 could be a 15 year old kid with a hockey bag filled with weed and you could be offered huge amounts of
00:28:17.600 money the amount of money that they were getting the research that we did was uh 1700 wholesale a
00:28:25.120 pound on a good day oh it was unbelievable right and these guys just wanted money most of them
00:28:30.240 right but then it kept getting bigger and bigger and the mode of transportation became more
00:28:35.200 sophisticated and you know people were banding together we did have you know criminal organizations
00:28:40.960 involved from the house angels to the united nations gang to the independent soldiers to the
00:28:45.040 red scorpions and the infamous bacon brothers right uh but there there were a lot of people
00:28:50.080 that just stayed at the lower level they wanted to make weed but of course on the other side
00:28:54.160 you're offering this product that's very lucrative they want to pay you back with their product right
00:28:59.840 so then it was cocaine you're going down with bc bud you're coming back with cocaine then it was
00:29:05.680 cocaine and firearms so you have money cocaine firearms but what was more important for these
00:29:11.440 groups was they were making connections that they never would have had the opportunity to make in
00:29:16.480 la with cartels because they had this great product and some of them were extremely entrepreneurial
00:29:25.280 and wanted to expand that.
00:29:26.780 And I've talked to people that were involved back in the day
00:29:30.240 and very high ranking people within organized crime groups
00:29:35.480 who have told me about meeting BC bikers in Sinaloa
00:29:42.160 who were not only trading BC bud,
00:29:44.980 but where there was one guy was actually giving a course
00:29:48.240 to Sinaloa on how to grow it.
00:29:50.520 Oh, wow.
00:29:51.980 Because they wanted this product, right?
00:29:53.980 I think that the, what was it, the Emerald Triangle in California had a similar scenario in, they all wanted homes in the Caribbean.
00:30:03.420 Well, then what they did was they set up the grow pattern in the Caribbean that then became another transport.
00:30:10.400 Same thing, the connections, right?
00:30:12.500 So that's how a lot of these groups made their international connections, right?
00:30:18.280 and um you know i talked to again this former uh person who sold cocaine in the u.s for sinaloa
00:30:26.040 um it's all documented uh telling me that he was first offered pills by a canadian
00:30:35.320 drug trafficker and he took them to his people in la and he's like
00:30:41.080 oh do we want to get into this and they weren't interested as methamphetamine
00:30:44.920 So again, and that was, he said he learned about that from a Canadian drug trafficker, right?
00:30:51.940 So, and what you then saw, so you have the networks being established, and they're still there to some degree, right?
00:30:58.780 Our product is still, like, there's a big problem in the UK right now with Canadian marijuana being transported over in bags and, you know, because it's not legal everywhere.
00:31:08.000 We forget that because we're like, eh, pot, who cares, right?
00:31:10.480 It's true, yeah.
00:31:10.860 We don't think about that.
00:31:11.760 It's a commodity.
00:31:12.700 Yeah.
00:31:13.200 just like you know you're like oh wow this is a big you know police oh we just busted this you
00:31:18.640 know illegal smoke cigarette ring right and you're thinking oh who cares but it's it's organized
00:31:23.600 crime and they'll use whatever product they can they can to make money to their network you know
00:31:28.320 and the networks still the networks are the same regardless of product it's funny that you see that
00:31:32.720 because uh say that because you see in toronto and i don't know in vancouver haven't noticed
00:31:36.800 we have indigenous cannabis stores that also sell indigenous cigarettes. But it's not. It is
00:31:45.040 nothing to do with any band or First Nations group. They're just moving through another channel.
00:31:52.880 Yeah. So anyway, those networks became established. And then what you started
00:31:58.160 seeing in the US, in the border states in particular, or in our West, border states
00:32:06.000 started legalizing medical marijuana.
00:32:09.180 Washington, Oregon, Idaho.
00:32:12.060 So once medical marijuana is legalized south of the border,
00:32:16.320 there's product that's been growing,
00:32:18.420 some of which was then being diverted.
00:32:20.760 They didn't need us as much.
00:32:22.280 So again, our guys were very entrepreneurial.
00:32:24.540 They had the network.
00:32:25.500 So they started producing synthetic drugs, right?
00:32:29.780 That's when you saw kind of the explosion
00:32:31.740 in synthetic drugs, right?
00:32:33.340 into the same ecstasy yeah and and and methamphetamine um you know ketamine like all kinds
00:32:40.300 of um products right and you know but there are different markets for them because some of it's
00:32:46.380 also produced in the us uh so then they're looking again internationally right and australia i guess
00:32:52.860 because it is an island and there's a lot you know it's got a good economy like there's even
00:32:58.060 like sort of a party scene where meth is very common right there's high-end meth users and you
00:33:03.660 want to look at the money like you can get math a kilo of mexican math for a few thousand dollars
00:33:10.460 here in bc if it's made in bc it costs more because you know the chemicals right so still
00:33:16.860 though under ten thousand dollars right that same kilo if it gets to australia can make as much as
00:33:23.580 200 000 australium which is a little bit less canadian but about that amount one kilo i have
00:33:29.340 to admit from an entrepreneurial standpoint i see how it can make a trip so you know 90 you
00:33:36.060 can lose 90 of your product and still make tons of money right um you know and and we've seen
00:33:41.980 these massive seizures at the port of vancouver like tons and tons of methamphetamine you know
00:33:47.340 Montreal, the same thing, Ontario, the same?
00:33:49.740 Yeah, but it's more in Vancouver because it's heading, you know, to Southeast Asia and to Australian New Zealand.
00:33:56.060 It's funny, we get it coming in and to the provinces, you're talking about a mass product going out.
00:34:01.980 And we know, you know, at ports, you know, very little of what comes in is examined.
00:34:07.500 It's about 3%.
00:34:09.060 Yeah.
00:34:09.720 Guess how much of what's going out is examined?
00:34:12.880 Can imagine it's zero.
00:34:14.460 One.
00:34:14.940 One percent.
00:34:15.460 Let's go with one percent, right?
00:34:16.780 This is a very small amount.
00:34:17.940 So, I mean, they, you know, to be fair, there is intelligence.
00:34:20.540 They do get tips.
00:34:21.620 They get tips from other jurisdictions that lead them to a container, you know, and there's
00:34:26.340 often that kind of information that's come in prior to them finding one of these big
00:34:30.960 loads, right?
00:34:31.820 And, you know, we've had cases where it's been hidden in maple syrup.
00:34:36.000 Oh, that's extremely ironic.
00:34:38.140 Canola oil, beer, you know, and then the other way products hidden too is sometimes it's
00:34:44.940 hidden in industrial machinery.
00:34:46.240 I've seen that recently, yeah, that seems to be, and it can be, like you say, the organized crime element is incredibly intelligent when it comes to finding new ways to do what they do.
00:34:58.620 Kim, look, I really appreciate this.
00:35:01.120 What's the one thing that you think Canadians should be watching in the way of organized crime before we get out of here, or in crime in Canada from the B.C. perspective?
00:35:11.540 Well, I think we do a pretty good job of catching the people down here at the lowest level.
00:35:18.740 We don't do a very good job of getting the kingpins at the top level. And that's because
00:35:23.620 of some legislative issues. It's resource issues and policing agencies, you know, because you might
00:35:29.380 have to have like a two or three year investigation involving surveillance and, you know, wiretap
00:35:37.060 and other, you know, and you might have to travel internationally to follow these guys.
00:35:41.960 You know, people have talked about, including BC Premier David Eby recently,
00:35:45.920 having RICO legislation, something that would help you go after the bigger players
00:35:51.340 or those who aid the bigger players.
00:35:53.280 Because so many things that are just on the periphery of organized crime,
00:35:56.800 they're not illegal in Canada.
00:35:57.880 No, you're right.
00:35:58.860 Banking, accounting, the corporate end of it.
00:36:02.280 I think we have to decide, do we take this seriously or not?
00:36:06.020 you know people are so happy when someone gets charged in the u.s it's kind of a cop-out right
00:36:10.900 like as a you know sovereign nation we should be held holding our own people to account i would
00:36:16.900 agree i would agree yeah so that would be it thanks i appreciate this listen is there anything
00:36:21.700 you want to plug while you're here not really all right well i appreciate that too support local
00:36:26.580 journalism how about that i love that thank you i really appreciate the time here okay my pleasure
00:36:31.620 Thanks for having me.