Inside Calgary's Gang War: The Untold Story Of Son Thanh Nguyen

Before Calgary's gang war reached national headlines, one name stood at the center of it all: Son Thanh Nguyen. This documentary explores his life, the rise of the Fresh Off the Boat (FOB) gang, and how Dial-A-Dope transformed Calgary's criminal underworld. In the late 1990s, Son Thanh Nguyen was just another teenager growing up in Calgary's northeast. Like many first-generation Vietnamese-Canadian youth, he attended Forest Lawn High School, where he formed close friendships with Tan Thanh Diep and others who would later become central figures in one of Alberta's most notorious street gangs. At the time, few could have predicted how quickly their lives would change. In the early 2000s they were allegedly introduced to Dial-A-Dope. Recognizing the opportunity, Son Nguyen and Tan Diep helped bring the model back to Calgary, where it quickly transformed the city's drug trade. What began as an innovative way to sell drugs soon evolved into a highly organized criminal enterprise—one that would eventually fuel the rise of the Fresh Off the Boat (FOB) gang and ignite one of the bloodiest gang wars in Alberta's history. This documentary examines Son Nguyen's life, his alleged rise within Calgary's criminal underworld and the violent chain of events that reshaped organized crime across Calgary. #organizedcrime #Freshofftheboat #calgary