The Current - The extortion threats facing B.C’s South Asian community

Episode Date: November 25, 2025

There’s fear and frustration in Surrey, BC..The city is facing a wave of violent extortion threats that have been gripping the province for the last two years. We speak with CBC’s Sohrab Sandhu about how the community is feeling. B.C. RCMP Assistant Commissioner John Brewer talks about whether law enforcement is doing enough and criminologist Wade Deisman takes a look at what the motive behind the violence might be.

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Donate at lovescarbro.cairbo. This is a CBC podcast. Hello, I'm Matt Galloway, and this is the current podcast. There is fear and frustration in Surrey, British Columbia, as that city battles an extortion crisis. There is a lot of anxiety, and unfortunately, you know, it has moved from, if it will be me, now it is when will it be me?

Surrey is the epicenter of a wave of violent extortion threats in B.C., targeting South Asian communities and businesses, some involving shooting. During a CBC town hall in Surrey earlier this month, residents demanded help. Three times our street has been shot up. What does the cops do come? They park a car in front and leave it there for a couple weeks and they're gone. My kids are scared, my family's scared, the whole neighbors are scared. I'm just asking elected officials and even the police officers, what are we waiting for? In a moment, I'll be speaking with one of the heads of BC's Joint Task Force about what's being done to tackle this issue. But first, we're joined by the

CBC's Sorab Sandu. He's based in Suri, has been covering this story. Sorab, good morning. Good morning, Matt. I said an extortion crisis. Just paint me a picture of this. What has been going on and what does it look like? Matt, this is the number one issue dominating the headlines in the lower mainland community here in BC. Almost every week, we are hearing reports of shots fired at either businesses or residences. Surrey police says they're investigating more than 100 cases of extortion-related incidents. It is becoming a huge crisis according to some people here in the community. Tell me more about this. I mean, it's interesting because there have been elements of extortion within South Asian communities in Toronto, in Edmonton, in Brampton,

but this is, as you've said, largely focused within the lower mainland of British Columbia. Tell me about the sense of fear that people are living with right now. You know, this has been going for a couple of years now. In fact, it was back in November of 2003 when police first warned local businesses that they were aware of an extortion letter going around targeting South Asian businesses. But we saw a brief lull in extortion-related incidents earlier this year. But at the start of summer, we saw extortion-related shootings increased dramatically. In fact, in October, we reached another grim milestone where we saw for the first time two people in two separate incidents injured in extortion-related shootings.

And I also spoke to some victims here in B.C. Satish Kumar is one of those victims whose multiple businesses were targeted. Take a lesson about what he has to say. I know. My life is on line right now. They threaten me. They kill me. They say they kill you. But I'm facing the consequences right now. My family faces the consequences right now. He says his life is on the line right now. That sounds, I mean, people must be terrified in the community. Yes, they are absolutely. I mean, there's murmurs within the community because of the fear when there's no clear information. There's a sense of the sphere gets increased when there's no clear direction where the police investigations are going, where people are asking questions, they're asking

for more transparency. So who is being targeted in these extortion attempts? There's a whole wide spectrum of people being targeted. We've seen Bollywood celebrities. We've seen a Punjabi pop star, AP Delo, whose home was targeted. Kapil Sharma, who's a famous Bollywood comedian. He has a cafe here in Surrey, which was targeted multiple times. And their local businessmen like Satish Kumar, even small-scale businesses have been targeted. And would you believe there's even a radio station that's been targeted? So, you know, the spectrum is quite white.

You've been covering this, given the fact that people are afraid for their lives. Are they willing to talk? or are people worried about retribution and perhaps more cautious about speaking to someone like you? Yes, absolutely. We have, you know, over the course of last two years, tried to speak to several victims. We had some success, but there have been many instances where people just refuse to come forward and speak because they think if they speak out, it's going to put a target on their back. We're going to talk more about this in a moment, but who do the victims think is behind all of this?

The victims that we have spoken to tell us that they often get a WhatsApp call, and the caller tells them in several of these instances that they are calling on behalf of Lawrence Bishnoi. Lawrence Bishnoy, as we know, is an India-based gangster who's been declared as a terrorist group here in Canada. And there could be some fact to that because as we see Abhijit Kingra, a 26-year-old man who was charged and arrested for shooting at AP Dillow's home, the code docs that CBC has been able to obtain shows that he was hired by Lawrence Pichanoi. But there are some concerns within the community that all of this could not be just Lawrence Bichanoi because we have instances of a small-scale business being targeted for a meager sum of $50,000. and some community members say that's not an Indian-based gangster who could do this. You were at that at that CBC Town Hall in Surrey. What were people there asking authorities to do? First of all, people are demanding arrests and charges.

They are also demanding transparency. Now, we saw CBSA a couple of weeks ago, announced that they had, you know, deported three people for extortion-related activity, but no names have been given out and it hasn't been said why, what incidents were they related to. So people are asking that they be named and shamed publicly. In the meantime, people in the community are living in fear. Absolutely. They are demanding that something changed real quick.

Sorab, thank you very much for this. Thank you, Matt. Sorab Sandu is a CBC video journalist based in Suri, British Columbia. In September, BC launched a specialized task force to address this wave of extortion. The RCMP assistant commissioner in British Columbia, John Brewer, is one of the leads on the task force and joins us now. John Brewer, good morning to you. Good morning. Thank you for having me. How would you describe this extortion crisis in British Columbia right now? It certainly is of grave concern to all police in British Columbia, particularly the BCRCMP,

and I'll say no amount of violence, whether it's physical or emotional or intimidation, is acceptable to any police organization when it's happening members of our public. From your perspective, what's going on? I mean, we heard Sorab describe the situation. What's happening on the ground? How are people experiencing this crisis, if I can put it that way? Yeah, so there has clearly been quite a large uptake in the number of extortions being attempted in certain communities within the lower mainland, but also certain other

communities across the country. It's clear that they run the gambit of large organized crimes. down to small-time copycats and everything in between. Who do we think is behind this wave of extortions? It's clear from our evidence. There's no one group or one type of group that's behind this. What started with clearly an unorganized crime attempt at gaining money from people has now branched off into all kinds of different groups, individuals, for that matter,

trying to use the current atmosphere of fear and intimidation to try to get in on this particular type of crime. We know that relations between Canada and India broke down after the former Trudeau government accused the Indian government of being involved in the killing of the sick activist, Hardy Singh-Nidger, in 2023. The Indian government denied this last year. The federal commissioner of the RCMP said that the RCNP had strong evidence showing at the highest levels the Indian government was involved in orchestrating a campaign of violence on Canadian soil, including murder and extortion and intimidation. What evidence is there that the RCMP has that the Indian government is involved in this extortion? Yeah, those are ongoing investigations. I'm not privy and able to

provide details on that. All I can say is that at all levels, whether it's local, provincial, or national and international, the RCMP at every level is coordinating with local law enforcement, provincial and international to get to the bottom of these particular crimes. We heard the frustration and fears in those communities where this violence is happening. And people at that CBC Town Hall say the RCMP has not done enough to clamp down on this. You yourself have said that people should be upset, that you understand why people are upset. Why did you say that? Well, because it's true.

And I totally understand if a member of my family or a business associated my family or my friends, I'd be upset. And I did say that initially we're on our back foot. You said that the police took too long to respond. Those are your words. The police took too long to respond. Yeah, correct. We did. And I'll tell you why, because these hit us hard and fast.

We don't have an unlimited supply of police officers. We're all working on other things, but two things became apparent. The volume of these particular crimes, but also the scope. So they were coming, crossing jurisdictions. The police in British Columbia, through, you know, coordinated with the ministry of the Solicester General, who's done a great job in leading to bring all the different agencies together under this task force, got together, and now we share intelligence, information, we cooperate in all investigations. And so we are moving forward very rapidly. I guess with the last point

on this, there have been, what, 50 extortion related incidents in Abbotsford alone since November of 23. You could understand why some people feel as though, to your point, I mean, there's action being taken out, but you can understand why people feel as though this was not getting the scrutiny that it deserved. Yeah, and you know what, when I say that, it's not that it wasn't getting the scrutiny it deserves. Within the local police and jurisdictions, they were working on these files, but there comes a point when you realize that they're doing cross-jurisdictional crime, and therefore we have to start being more aggressive in how we share information and intelligence and, in fact, coordinating our efforts. As Sora mentioned, there was the shooting

last year at the Punjabi singer, AP Dillon's House, in Victoria. And media outlets in India reported that the Bishnoi gang, based in India, had claimed responsibility for that shooting. What do we know about the involvement of the Bishnoi gang in these extortion cases? Yeah, certainly in that case, we are aware that there is a direct connection between the Bishnoi gang and that file. In other files, it's not as clear. And in other files where the allegation has been made, we find no evidence of that. We think and we believe that there's certainly times where a small time or a smaller organized crime will mention that name to bring a little more pressure to the person who are trying to extort. At that town hall, community members called for arrests. You have made some arrests. Tell me a little bit about who you have detained.

We have made a number of arrests. We have got charges to the courts through Crown being approved. We have several other investigations that are with Crown and we're working with. them to get charge approval as we speak. So yeah, I will say that, you know, it's not coming fast enough for people. And my experience is it never is. I totally understand that. But I know the task force is working around the clock to bring forward charges. And that's what's going to change this, not simply just arrests. We have to get the proper amount of evidence before the courts so we can get convictions. And then couple that with education where people don't pay, people preserve the evidence, get in touch with their local police of jurisdiction as soon as possible

and cooperate with police. That's what's happening now. And that's why we're seeing great strides in these investigations. In the meantime, as we've said, people are living in fear in some of these communities. Just last week, a business in Abbotsford was shot up. The owner said he got a call demanding a million dollars. What do you tell people? I mean, what is their advice, your advice, to people when they're threatened like this? The first thing is contact your local police of jurisdiction. as soon. And then they work diligent to create a safety plan. Each safety plan is unique to that particular file to keep everybody as safe as possible. But the key to that is cooperation. One thing is particularly, rings true throughout these investigations. If you pay, it won't stop.

I will tell people that. This is only going to stop through education in the community, cooperation with law enforcement and law enforcement be able to put the best evidentiary package forward to crown to the courts so we can get convictions. John Brewer, good to speak with you. Thank you. Thank you very much. John Brewer is BC's RCMP assistant commissioner. He heads up a joint task force tackling extortion in the lower mainland of British Columbia. This ascent isn't for everyone. You need grit to climb this high this often. You've got to be an underdog that always over delivers. You've got to be 6,500 hospital staff, 1,000 doctors all doing so much with so little.

You've got to be Scarborough Defined by our uphill battle And always striving towards new heights And you can help us keep climbing Donate at lovescarbro.cairbo.ca.a. Are your pipes ready for a deep freeze? You can take action to help protect your home from extreme weather. Discover prevention tips that can help you be climate ready

at keep it intact.ca. Diceman is a criminologist with the University of the Fraser Valley. He has been following these extortion cases closely. Wade, good morning to you. Good morning. What do you think the motive is behind these extortion cases? Given the dramatic change in the pattern of these extortions and the dramatic increase in the frequency of these extortions, I think there's a high probability anyway. We don't have all of the facts at this point, but a high probability that it's linked to a change in the tenor and cordiality of relations between Canada and India. And I think that that goes back to the assassination of Mr. Najjar and the subsequent accusations raised in the

house by Mr. Trudeau. We saw quite a dramatic uptick in extortion since that point and quite a change in their character. So what do you mean that it's linked to that? I mean, the Indian government, if you're pointing a finger at them, has denied involvement in not just the assassination of Hardy-Singinger, but also in any crime that has occurred in this country. And so what do you believe the link is between what we heard from Justin Trudeau when he was Prime Minister and what we're seeing now? Well, what Justin Trudeau said essentially is that they had intelligence evidence that had come partially through the five eyes that indicated that the government was involved in the highest

levels. There had long been a history of struggles around diasporic kind of opposition to what was happening in the Punjab region. There has long been between Canada and India a struggle around this kind of thing. I look for what has changed in the material circumstances in the communities. And it's not as though the level of guardianship in these communities changed and the level of policing didn't change. The vulnerability of the victims didn't change. So there's only one thing left and that's what we call the pool of motivated offenders. Now, why would that pool of motivated offenders increase? And you look for circumstances and situations that might explain the root cause of an

uprising and flow of motivated offenders, and you try to rule things out. And then you look to the political scene and incorporate national security information, and that appears to be the most plausible explanation. Now, we're not talking at the level of proof, but what other explanation is there for this uprise across Canada. As you indicated earlier, this is a pan-Canadian phenomenon. It's not just about money, you believe. I believe that it's about what we call political domination and criminology, and all the evidence points in that direction. The character of the extortion, it's targeting high-profile

people. So it's being done to send a symbolic message. I believe its aim is submission, and it's being done quite brazenly, and in a haphazard way, they move from target to target, stick and move. When I say brazen, sometimes it's being done in daylight hours. I think that's another one. They're targeting people that they know have recourse to public channels like targeting a radio host, for example, Jenny Sims. What do you make of the police response? We just heard from John Brewer, the assistant commissioner for the RC&P in BC, who admits that police relate to this, understands why people would be angry. It is now taking action to deal with it. But what do you make thus far of the sweep of the police response? Well, I have to say that I'm

quite dubious about the contention that this is a problem where the public needs to be educated. That's not what the literature on policing would suggest at all. The reason the public isn't coming forward, I think, or the reason why they're worried about the public not coming forward is basically because of trust. They're not sure that the RCMP or the Surrey Police Service are going to be able to protect them. They haven't had a good track record so far. People are terrified at this point, very scared, frightened. And there's a danger of communities collapsing, where they just turn inward and become isolated. And then we see a total vulnerability. And I think that the aim of the RCMP isn't so much education as outreach and trust building. I'm not asking you

to speak for the community, but do you think, based on what you've seen right now, that people believe the RC&P is there for them? If we see these cases continue, is there the sense that that trust has been built yet? Well, certainly at the public forum, what I heard very clearly was this plaintive question, are you going to protect us? And then the secondary one was really, can you protect us? And I think mixed in with that was a worry that Canada might have less than a fulsome response because it was concerned about trade with India. In view of that, I think that the community needs much more reassurance. Are you worried about that? I mean, I'm not asking you specifically to comment on politics, but if you want the police and provincial and federal governments to be more involved,

you also have the prime minister who has said that he's looking at, I mean, he met with the leader of Indian, Randra Modi, and is talking about building a more robust trade relationship with that nation. So how can, can the federal government respond if that's also happening as we're talking? Yeah, I think that that exact perception is what is fueling a lot of fear in these communities. What would you want the police then just finally to do, to ensure that these numbers, that what we're seeing right now, is addressed in a meaningful way? And the people, more importantly, people in the community feel safe. We do have a track record of evidence that shows that there is a more profound strategy

to pursue in cases like this where there's evidence of intimidation. And we saw in the 2005 terrorist bombings in London, the community banded together and through action with the police and the security service created a campaign called We Are Not Afraid. It's a public denunciation of the actions. It's a public defiance, a refusal to be cowed and intimidation. and I would say it worked in a tremendously effective way in strengthening the sense that the community would be okay

as long as it's stuck together. Wade Diceman, thank you very much. Thank you. Wade Diceman is a criminologist with the University of the Fraser Valley. You've been listening to the current podcast. My name is Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening.

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