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An alleged drug smuggler for accused kingpin Ryan Wedding – recently connected to a man charged in a sprawling Toronto police corruption investigation – has been moved to a special unit of a Toronto jail.
Gurpreet Singh’s lawyer told a Toronto court the transfer occurred last Friday, two days after CBC News first reported on Singh’s apparent ties to Brian Da Costa, an alleged organized crime figure described by York Regional Police as a key player in their high-profile corruption probe known as Project South.
Singh “has been placed in a special handling unit and has had limited access to counsel and the outside world since then,” his lawyer Christopher Lutes said at a brief hearing on Wednesday.
Singh has been held at the maximum-security Toronto South Detention Centre (TSDC) since he was arrested in October 2024 at his then residence, on the 34th floor of Toronto’s former Trump Hotel. He continues to fight extradition to the U.S., where the 32-year-old faces federal charges in connection with Wedding’s alleged cocaine-smuggling ring.
CBC News has confirmed a link between a man charged in a Toronto police corruption probe and an associate of alleged drug lord Ryan Wedding. Brian Da Costa has been ordered not to contact Gurpreet Singh, one of Wedding’s suspected narcotics smugglers.
Last week, CBC revealed Da Costa had been ordered to have no contact with Singh — and 34 other people — as part of the conditions of his recent release on bail. Da Costa, an alleged drug trafficker, is accused of bribing Toronto police officers amid a conspiracy that investigators said they uncovered last year following an unsuccessful attempt to kill a TSDC manager.
Singh has not been charged in connection with Project South, but two sources told CBC that he is connected to the investigation. Authorities have not publicly laid out those ties.
Another one of Singh’s lawyers, Brian Greenspan previously declined to say whether he or his client had spoken with investigators in connection with Project South.
It is not clear what prompted the move last week to the TSDC.
Greenspan’s colleague Lutes told the court on Wednesday “we’ve made inquiries about his transfer to that unit, which have gone unanswered.”
A 2018 report into institutional violence in Ontario said inmates can be moved to the special handling unit “following negative behaviour” in the jail.
Brent Ross, a spokesperson for Ontario’s Ministry of the Solicitor General, which is in charge of provincial jails, declined to comment to CBC.
York police announced last month that Project South had led to the arrest of seven Toronto officers, a retired constable and 19 other civilians, including Da Costa.
Deputy Chief Ryan Hogan said Da Costa, 43, was involved in a “sophisticated” operation which involved cannabis, cocaine and methamphetamine trafficking, and shipping drugs to Europe.
Singh accused of ties to notorious criminal groups
As for Singh, U.S. prosecutors have described the former dump truck driver as being “deeply enmeshed in the criminal underworld.”
At his bail hearing in March 2025, Singh complained about conditions at the TDSC, telling the court he’s been held with two other inmates in a cell with only two beds, while under lockdown “probably half the time.”
“No shower, no visits, no phone call,” Singh said. Jail staff “wake us up maybe 5, 6 in the morning, take us to the scanners, strip search us.”
Singh was one of four men in Ontario arrested on the same day in 2024, amid allegations they acted as accomplices in the murderous drug-smuggling organization purportedly led by Wedding.
According to U.S. prosecutors, Singh and his uncle and co-accused, Hardeep Ratte co-ordinated at least two shipments, totalling more than 650 kilograms of cocaine from California to Canada for Wedding’s network.
Singh and Ratte purportedly agreed to move the drugs for a rate of $220,000 per truck load, in a meeting held at a Brampton, Ont. auto body shop and secretly recorded by an FBI informant who was later shot dead in Colombia.
U.S. prosecutors allege Singh has far-reaching connections abroad, including ties to the Kinahan organized crime group, a notorious syndicate founded in Ireland and now directed from Dubai. Authorities have linked the group to large-scale drug trafficking in Europe, money laundering, firearms trafficking and murder.
Federal prosecutors in Los Angeles have alleged Singh was also involved in a scheme to ship stolen high-end cars to Dubai, through the port of Montreal.
What’s more, Singh reported being kidnapped “and tied up” by Mexican cartel members while on a visit to Sinaloa state in August 2024 – purportedly over a $600,000 drug debt. According to court records, Wedding himself had to intervene to ensure Singh’s release.
At his bail hearing, Singh claimed his own lengthy stays in Dubai, Mexico and Colombia were business trips on behalf of his girlfriend, who was seeking new locations for her Toronto breakfast restaurant.
The judge described the explanation as “palpably false.”
