WNBA star Brittney Griner goes on trial in Russian court
American basketball star Brittney Griner went on trial 4-1/2 months after her arrest on charges of possessing cannabis oil while returning to play for a Russian team, in a case that unfolded amid tense relations between Moscow and Washington.
The Phoenix Mercury center and two-time U.S. Olympic gold medallist was arrested in February in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport after police said she was carrying vape canisters with cannabis oil. She could face up to 10 years in prison if convicted of large-scale transportation of drugs.
Griner, 31, was escorted into the courtroom in the Moscow suburb of Khimki while handcuffed and wearing a Jimi Hendrix
T-shirt. At a closed-door preliminary hearing, her detention was extended for another six months, to December 20.
Fewer than 1% of defendants in Russian criminal cases are acquitted, and unlike in the
U.S., acquittals can be overturned.
Griner’s case comes at an extraordinarily low point in Moscow-washington relations.
Griner was arrested less than a week before
Russia sent troops into Ukraine, which aggravated already high tensions between the two countries. The U.S. then imposed sweeping sanctions on Moscow, and Russia denounced the U.S. for sending weapons to Ukraine.