A British Columbia man who police allege had crime connections across the world has been shot dead in Mexico.

Tom Gisby was killed in a Starbucks near Puerto Vallarta on Friday night, according to RCMP Chief Superintendent Dan Malo.

“When an individual like that is killed, whether it’s local here in British Columbia like we’ve seen in the last several months, or abroad, the police often see retaliatory either wants or wishes or retaliatory action that takes place, here in British Columbia if the resident is from British Columbia,” Malo said.

The 50-year-old Gisby was from the Fraser Valley, east of Vancouver.

“We wanted to get our message to the community that this wasn’t an individual who was simply on holidays,” Malo said Saturday. “This is a well-known target, a well-known organized crime figure here in British Columbia.”

Gisby was the head of his own gang, known as the Gisby Group, that made profit by bringing illegal guns and drugs into B.C.

“He has networks internationally to be able to bring illegal commodities into Canada for distribution,” Malo said.

Mounties were aware that Gisby had travelled to Mexico, said Malo, who is in charge of the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit.

“Even though Thomas Gisby, in his own right, thought that he was at a high-enough level in organized crime that he would be isolated from violence, it’s clearly not the case.”