CBC News has obtained a copy of a letter the Lawrence Bishnoi gang sent Canada’s “defence minister, army and police” last year claiming to have 5,000 gang members in Canada and “more guns” than the police.
The letter sent to the Abbotsford Police Department and signed “Lawrence gang from India” was released through an Access to Information Act request for exhibits from an Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) hearing for a Bishnoi associate who was ordered deported in July.
A police officer who testified at the hearing referred to the letter’s existence, but the full text has never been made public.
“We are giving you a written warning and challenge. We are Indian gang Canada has no guts to stop us is that clear — we will rule in CANADA now no one can stop us we are very powerful,” reads the letter, which is riddled with spelling errors and lacks punctuation.
“This is our time now Indian we have more than 5000 gang member in Canada they can do shooting for only $1000 can you stop us no way. You will see we will takeover CANADA soon.”
‘Tactical Guide’ to the Bishnoi gang
The letter is part of a trove of documents and videos highlighting multi-jurisdictional, multi-agency efforts to disrupt the amorphous cells of young Indian nationals behind the extortion crisis gripping Canadian communities.
The documents include allegations against two men identified by the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) this week for their links to Bishnoi-related extortion cases.
According to the files, Amitoz Bajwa and Sahibjot Singh were part of a web of Edmonton-based suspects in their early 20s implicated in shootings and threats against victims in Alberta, Ontario and British Columbia.
The documents include the CBSA’s “Tactical Guide” to the Bishnoi organization, which traces the gang’s growth in Canada from 2023 to late 2025.
Lawrence Bishnoi has been in jail in India since 2015, but has built an international organization from behind bars.
In Canada, Bishnoi has allegedly relied on his top lieutenant, Goldy Brar, who obtained a student permit in 2017 to attend Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops.
It’s unknown if Brar actually attended classes, but he filed a refugee claim in 2019 which was deemed abandoned in 2022. His current whereabouts are unknown.
Goldy Brar and Goldy Dhillon
According to the documents, Brar and Lawrence Bishnoi split last year, becoming rivals.
“It is unclear if Goldy is leveraging his split from the Bishnoi Gang to take over operations in Canada, as recent intelligence indicates that Goldy’s name is the one most often used in extortion cases in [Alberta],” the CBSA’s guide reads.
This summer, the FBI posted a $50,000 reward for information leading to Brar’s capture after announcing charges against Bishnoi and his associates for conspiracy and killings including the alleged murder of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey in 2023.
The CBSA’s tactical guide names other gang leaders behind extortion cases in Canada, including Goldy Dhillon, a subcontractor believed responsible for “recruiting ‘foot soldiers’ to carry out criminal activities including targeted attacks and extortions in India and Canada.”
Both Dhillon and Brar’s names feature prominently in one of the most revealing documents contained in the information released to CBC News: a detailed ongoing investigative summary compiled by the Organized Crime Branch of the Edmonton Police Service.
‘They all have to pay us’
At nearly 200 pages, the report on the probe known as Project Garter reads like a police procedural novel, with a through-line drawn from the daily reports of investigators overseeing more than a dozen files involving multiple extortion victims.
The investigation covers seven months starting in May 2025. The letter from the Bishnoi gang was delivered in mid-August 2025 and is copied verbatim into the report.
“Very soon every business owner have to pay protection money to us it is like TAX,” the letter reads.
“No other way around for any business. so do not try to stop us and doesn’t matter Indian or white or black community businessman they all have to pay us.”
The report claims the letter fits a pattern of threats from the “Lawrence Group” and “the Lawrence Bishnoi Group” attached to shootings and extortion cases across the country.
In the Project Garter files, ballistics reports linked shootings in Edmonton, Calgary and Surrey. Police also doggedly followed social media accounts of suspects and obtained search warrants and tracking warrants for vehicles and phones to pinpoint movement.
When a Ford Mustang was reportedly stolen and used for drive-by shootings, investigators grilled one of the owners who reported the theft of the vehicle, combing through Instagram and the vehicle’s “infotainment system” data to link the owner to other gang members.
‘I am talking from Lawrence Bishnoi group’
The report also describes multiple victims, including the owner of a giant business targeted for millions of dollars by a suspect who verbally identified himself as Goldy Dhillon.
The victim told police another family member had also seen his Surrey-based business burned to the ground after similar demands.
Jashandeep Singh (left) was caught on video holding a gun linked to multiple extortion cases to the head of a friend at a birthday party. The video was included in the evidence used to find Singh inadmissible to Canada. (CBC News)
In a separate incident, police warned another man about credible threats to his life.
The demands for money came from more than a dozen WhatsApp numbers — at least two of which were also linked to extortion files investigated by Peel Regional Police in Ontario. The report includes the translated text of one message left after a victim refused to respond.
“I am talking from Lawrence Bishnoi group. This time I shot at your house, next time it’s going to be you. I know exactly what your system is. Where you are what you do, I can find you,” the message reads.
“Either talk to us and settle this and it will be good for you guys. Or shots will be fired at your entire family. Not answering the phone will not make this go away.”
A gun with a pink slide
The documents obtained by CBC News were compiled by the CBSA for disclosure at an IRB hearing that resulted in a ruling of inadmissibility for Jashandeep Singh — a 25-year-old who came to Canada as a student in December 2022.
Singh was tied to the group through his friendship with Arshdeep Singh, a mid-level Bishnoi leader deported from Canada earlier this year after he was also found inadmissible for organized criminality.
Jashandeep Singh was accused of helping to conceal a distinctive weapon that linked Arshdeep Singh to shootings in Surrey and Edmonton.
The documents presented at the IRB included a video of Jashandeep Singh pointing the gun — which has a pink slide — to a friend’s head.
Arshdeep Singh posted a video of himself firing this gun into the air on his birthday in August 2025. Investigators later found bullet casings at the scene which matched casings found at an extortion related shooting in Surrey. (CBC News)
CBC News has previously reported on the broad scope of allegations against Arshdeep Singh, but the police report includes detailed information about his alleged activities and an analysis of the contents of his phone.
Phone intercepts caught Arshdeep Singh talking about trafficking in heroin, opioids and cocaine and bragging about committing a murder that happened when he would have been 12 years old.
He was also allegedly caught speaking to an associate about shooting incidents in Surrey and instructing them to “go to your city and gather some weapons.”
According to the documents, Arshdeep Singh has been linked to extortion cases in Ontario, including one in which he was caught on video allegedly directing others to throw Molotov cocktails at a building.
An analysis of his phone included messages containing information about dozens of vehicles which were later reported stolen — uncovering a ring in which thieves worked with owners to target cars and trucks, altering identifying information and defrauding insurance companies.
But it was the gun with the pink slide that would prove Arshdeep Singh’s undoing.
According to testimony from Jashandeep Singh’s IRB hearing, Arshdeep Singh came to Edmonton in August 2025 from Calgary to celebrate his birthday.
The evidence disclosed to the IRB includes videos of Arshdeep Singh and others fooling around with the gun at Jashandeep Singh’s residence, before driving to a remote highway location with the weapon for further celebration.
Arshdeep Singh can then be seen in a video firing the weapon into the air at least five times. A birthday cake sits on the trunk of his car as his friends watch.
According to the police report, investigators saw the video on social media and attended the scene after Arshdeep Singh and the others left, finding bullet casings which ballistics reports would later match to one in a string of shootings at Kap’s Cafe in Surrey.
That discovery set in motion a chain of police activity resulting in multiple arrests, the execution of numerous search warrants, the discovery of more weapons and, ultimately, the gathering of evidence that would result in deportation orders against numerous suspects.
Like many of those suspected in the extortion cases, Arshdeep Singh was never convicted of a crime in Canada. But the bar for immigration inadmissibility is lower than the level of evidence needed for a criminal conviction and a person can’t be deported with charges unresolved.
Arshdeep Singh didn’t challenge the deportation order against him, but told his hearing he was “not involved in any of the extortion, arson, any fraud anywhere.”
The final pages of the package of documents released to CBC News include worrying claims about the evolution of the extortion crisis provided to the Edmonton Police Service by a confidential informant in May 2025.
The informant claimed to have personal knowledge and claimed Arshdeep Singh was working for Goldy Brar, who was in turn directing people in Canada to commit extortions.
“Kidnapping people is a new extortion tactic directed by Goldy Brar. People are extorted up to $100,000.00 for a kidnapping,” the informant claimed, according to a written statement.
“Young Canadian visa holders are directed to do the kidnapping.”
