Two Air Canada Ground Workers, 62.5 Kilos of Cocaine Out of Punta Cana, and Not One Charge Laid: the RCMP Searches Two Homes and a Dorval Work Base, Then Releases Both Suspects the Same Day (August 26, 2026)

DORVAL — The Royal Canadian Mounted Police went to two houses, a car and an airline work base on Wednesday morning, August 26, 2026, arrested two Air Canada employees who handle baggage on the ground at Montréal–Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport, and had both of them back out the door by the end of the day without a single count on paper. What the force alleges is a conspiracy to walk luggage through the secure side of an international airport — cocaine coming in from Punta Cana, cannabis going back out the other way — and the way it was allegedly done was as plain as swapping the tag on a suitcase.

The arrests are the visible end of a file that has been running since May, when the Canada Border Services Agency pulled 62.5 kilograms of cocaine out of backpacks carried on a flight arriving from the Dominican resort city. The RCMP has named no criminal organization at any point in this file, and none is attached here.

Two Arrests With Nothing Attached to Them

The gap between the scale of what was seized and the legal position of the two men is the whole story of this release. A hundred and eighteen and a half kilograms of controlled substances have come off this investigation across two interceptions, and as of Wednesday afternoon nobody stands charged with any of it. The force is explicit about why: the evidence gathered in the morning’s searches has to be analysed first, and only then does it say charges may follow.

That is a normal sequence in a federal file and an unusual one to announce publicly mid-stream. The RCMP chose to put out a statement on the day of the searches rather than wait for a charge decision, which put Air Canada in the position of confirming, the same morning, that it had been told of “the investigation into two of its employees and their arrests” and that both had been suspended.

The Tag Is the Weak Point, Not the Fence

Nothing in the RCMP account describes a breach of the airport’s perimeter. The alleged access was legitimate. Both individuals were cleared to be inside restricted areas because handling baggage is the job. Aéroports de Montréal, asked about it, pointed to exactly that: restricted-area access at the airport is governed by screening and verification conducted by the appropriate authorities and employers, with ongoing controls carried out by security partners including the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority and Airport Security.

What the allegation targets is the baggage-tag system itself. A bag with the right tag goes where the tag says. Guertin’s description — switching tags so a bag full of narcotics rides on somebody else’s routing — describes a scheme that needs no forced door and no cut fence, only somebody with a badge standing where the bags are sorted.

The route runs both directions. Cocaine was imported from Punta Cana; cannabis was exported to Punta Cana. That is a two-way pipeline on the same corridor, which is a different proposition from a one-off importation and implies a receiving end at the Dominican airport as well.

What This Is Not

No gang, family, syndicate or network has been named by the RCMP, and none is named here. Montreal’s bulk cocaine importation economy has for decades been discussed publicly in terms of the port and the airport, and in terms of the organisations documented in the Rizzuto crime family file and, on the distribution side in Quebec, the Hells Angels in Canada. Neither has been connected to this investigation by any police force. The RCMP has said only that two employees were arrested and that the analysis is not finished.

The force is asking anyone with information about illicit activities to call 514-939-8300 or 1-800-771-5401, or to attend a local police station.