Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada supports RCMP dismantling of alleged CAD 16 million illicit cannabis network and laundering through the banking system

Ontario’s Royal Canadian Mounted Police announced it had dismantled a complex illicit cannabis production and distribution network, seizing and destroying about 17,000 plants across three illegal grow sites and charging six individuals. The Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC) was listed among the partner agencies that supported the investigation, which also alleges that millions in profits were laundered through the Canadian banking system. The investigation began in summer 2022 following a referral from the Ontario Provincial Police. Police estimate the operations could have produced more than CAD 16 million annually, with sites staffed by full-time live-in workers who lacked legal status to work and grow cannabis in Canada, and links to two additional illicit production sites dismantled by the Ontario Provincial Police and the Toronto Police Service. The RCMP alleges the network exported illicit cannabis to the United States and Hong Kong and planned to expand into Europe, and that identity fraud was used to apply for Health Canada medicinal cannabis authorizations in the names of individuals unaware of the applications, with those authorizations then used to secure commercial leases and expand production. All accused were arrested and released on an undertaking, with a first court appearance scheduled for May 7, 2025 at the Ontario Court of Justice in Toronto.