Mexican authorities have arrested a Canadian fugitive who has been wanted since 2022 in connection with an investigation into an international trafficking operation that smuggled drugs to Manitoba.

Denis Ivziku was arrested on May 14 in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, according to a statement from Canada’s Justice Department. He is now facing extradition proceedings and faces Canadian charges for conspiracy to traffic a controlled substance and conspiracy to possess proceeds obtained by crime, the department said in a Thursday statement to CBC.

In 2022, Manitoba RCMP said Ivziku, from the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, was wanted in connection with Project Divergent.

The multi-year investigation, launched in 2018, infiltrated an international trafficking operation involving large volumes of Mexican cartel drugs that were smuggled into Manitoba, then distributed across the country, police said.

They announced 20 arrests in connection with that investigation in 2022 but said Ivziku had fled. The now 28-year-old has been on the run from authorities since. 

During a trial late last year for Damion Ryan, a high-level member of the Hells Angel outlaw motorcycle gang arrested during Project Divergent, court was told Ivziku sold multiple kilograms of methamphetamine to a drug-dealer-turned-informant who helped the RCMP on separate occasions.

Crown attorneys at the trial said Ivziku, also known as “Menace” and “Elvis P,” is Ryan’s brother-in-law.

Ryan was found guilty last year of conspiring to traffic in methamphetamine, cocaine and fentanyl, and conspiracy to profit from the proceeds of crime as a member of an organized crime group, with the judge saying he was a “key” part of the drug trafficking network.