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More than 52,000 illegal cigarettes as well as drugs and weapons are off the streets and a 60-year-old man is facing charges following an RCMP raid on a home in the village of Pilger last week.
Saskatchewan RCMP said in a news release on Aug. 31 that the home was searched by officers on Aug. 27 as part of a drug trafficking investigation where police said they found and seized 530 grams of cocaine and seven grams of methamphetamine as well as the unstamped cigarettes and 40 grams of unstamped cannabis.
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Officers also seized items including a firearm, a baton, a Taser and an undisclosed sum of cash.
Charges for the man, who was arrested at the home, include possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking, possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose, unauthorized possession of a firearm, and possession of a prohibited weapon. He is also charged with selling or distributing unstamped tobacco products, and possession of property obtained by crime under $5,000.
He was remained in custody and appeared in Saskatoon Provincial Court on Aug. 31
RCMP said the arrest was made the help of Prince Albert Crime Reduction Team, the Warrant Enforcement and Suppression Team, and the Critical Incident Response Team as well as Humboldt RCMP.
The village of Pilger is on Highway 20 about 100 km from Saskatoon.
In January, a 41-year-old man from Brampton, Ont. was arrested and charged after 23 pallets of unstamped tobacco containing approximately 9.1 million illicit cigarettes were found in a truck and trailer stopped by RCMP on Highway 16 in the RM of Battle River.
In February, 26 pallets of illegal cigarettes estimated to contain about 7.2 million cigarettes, were found by Saskatchewan Highway Patrol officers during an inspection at a weigh scale on Highway 1. Two men, also from Brampton, Ont. and aged 24 and 28 were arrested and charged.
In November 2025, Mounties found more than 9.3 million illegal cigarette in a semi stopped at the Langham weigh scale on Highway 16. In that case a 24-year-old man from Ontario was arrested and charged.
According to the Government of Saskatchewan, RCMP must report all seizures of illicit tobacco to the federal Ministry of Finance under The Tobacco Tax Act because untaxed tobacco directly impacts public revenue and involves complex tax evasion laws and is often linked to organized crime.
The federal government says RCMP and Criminal Intelligence Service Canada have identified over 175 organized crime groups operating in Canada’s illegal tobacco market.
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