No Canadians charged after meth-laced beer kills New Zealand man

More than a year after a young man in New Zealand died from drinking meth-laced beer shipped from Canada, no Canadians have been arrested or charged.

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More than a year after a young man in New Zealand died from drinking meth-laced beer shipped from Canada, no Canadians have been arrested or charged in connection with what police in New Zealand describe as the country’s largest-ever methamphetamine bust.

The 2023 death of 21-year-old Aiden Sagala in Auckland sparked Operation Lavender, a two-year investigation that uncovered more than a tonne of methamphetamine hidden in beer cans and other beverage shipments exported mainly from Canada.

Sagala died after drinking from a can labelled Honey Bear House Beer, a fake brand used to conceal liquid meth.

Police say the cans were handed out at his workplace by his boss, Himatjit “Jimmy” Kahlon, who was later convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 21 years in prison.

A subsequent investigation found nearly 29,000 cans of the bogus beer inside an Auckland warehouse, most containing regular beer but some filled with methamphetamine.

Police also found shipments of kombucha from the U.S., coconut water from India and additional cases of beer from Toronto, all used to conceal methamphetamine imports to Auckland.

The warehouse where the contraband was delivered was covered in meth, according to New Zealand police.

A Wednesday statement from the country’s police force announced that four Auckland properties worth about $36 million have been seized following a two-year investigation into Sagala’s death.

Property seizures in New Zealand operate similarly to civil forfeiture in Canada, where the property housing Canada’s largest fentanyl and crystal meth super lab in Falkland, B.C., was also seized by authorities following a police bust last fall.

Only one man, Gaganpeeer Singh Randhawa, was arrested in relation to that operation.

To date, no Canadians have been publicly arrested, charged or connected to the case of deadly meth-filled fake beer in New Zealand.

New Zealand, where meth is more expensive than anywhere else in the world, is seen by transnational crime groups as an ideal export destination.

In Mexico, meth costs about $500 a kilogram. In Canada, that same amount sells for $10,000, while in New Zealand one kilogram sells for almost $300,000.

New Zealand Customs data obtained by the CTV program W5 in collaboration with the Investigative Journalism Foundation indicate that Canada is the number one exporter of methamphetamine to New Zealand.

According to their data, from 2020 to 2024, New Zealand seized more meth from Canada than from any other country—1,200 kilograms—with an estimated street value of about $350 million.

W5 also identified the director of Petrichor Beverages, the company that shipped the liquid methamphetamine to New Zealand—drawing a connection to Canada.

According to Canadian corporate documents, the director of the company is listed as Azizdeep Singh Sandhu—a Surrey man and the registered owner of a property in Delta, B.C., who denied any association with the company or the case.

Those Canadian corporate documents additionally show that Petrichor was incorporated in 2021—the year before the beer was shipped to New Zealand—and does not appear to have shipped anything else in its brief existence.

The Canadian federal government dissolved the company in 2024 for unspecified “non-compliance.”

When reached for comment, Sandhu denied any connection to the company and told W5’s Haines no one from the RCMP had reached out to him about the matter.

As part of a multipart investigative report, RCMP Chief Superintendent and Director General of the National Serious and Organized Crime Program, Mathieu Bertrand, sat down with W5’s Haines to answer questions about what the RCMP is doing to combat the exportation of methamphetamine to New Zealand.

Haines asked Bertrand if he knew who shipped the liquid methamphetamine to New Zealand.

Bertrand said he couldn’t “speak to that” as the RCMP was “not involved” in the matter.

However, contrary to Bertrand’s comments, an RCMP spokeswoman later confirmed via email that the agency had in fact been involved in the Canadian side of the Honey Bear beer investigation.

“The RCMP did receive intelligence reports from the New Zealand Police and investigated it,” according to an emailed statement to CTV News.

It remains unclear if that investigation is ongoing.