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In the 135th day since Brittney Griner’s detention in Russia on drug charges, the WNBA star’s trial is expected to begin Friday in a courtroom outside Moscow. However, instead of the promise of a fair trial and the chance of an acquittal, US officials and experts on the Russian legal system expect the proceedings to be a show trial, with a conviction all but certain.
“I’m pretty convinced the process is already rigged,” said Daniel Fried, a Russia expert who served as ambassador and senior State Department official under three US presidents and is now a fellow at the Atlantic Council. Given Russian President Vladimir Putin’s track record, Fried said “respect for the rule of law is not something the Kremlin takes seriously.”
Griner, 31, was arrested on February 17 at an airport outside Moscow when Russian customs officials allegedly found vape cartridges containing hashish oil in her luggage. If convicted, she could face up to 10 years in prison. A two-time Olympic gold medalist and eight-time All-Star for the Phoenix Mercury, Greiner traveled to join UMMC Ekaterinburg, the Russian team she played for during the WNBA offseason.
After several extensions of Griner’s detention, the court this week indicated that her trial will begin on Friday. Her lawyer, Alexander Boykov, told Russian media that he expected it to last two months.
Although Griner’s family and supporters have rallied with increasing intensity to demand her release, there is little indication that her path to freedom will go through the Russian justice system, where about 99 percent of criminal cases end in conviction.
“Usually it’s not about what the sentence will be,” said Thomas Firestone, a former resident legal adviser at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. “It’s more a question of what the verdict will be.”
Firestone, a partner at the law firm Stroock & Stroock & Lavan, said a case like Griner’s would typically be heard by a single judge, as opposed to a jury, and would be open to the public, albeit with few vacancies. Griner herself was expected to attend, sitting in a protected glass case.
With U.S.-Russian relations at their most strained since the Cold War, largely as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, U.S. officials and experts view the developments surrounding Greener’s case as a series of political, not legal maneuvers. In May, the U.S. State Department declared Griner’s case an “unlawful detention,” an official classification that transferred oversight of her case to the office of the U.S. President’s Special Envoy for Hostage Affairs.
“Britney is in every way a political prisoner [whose detainment was] a deeply cynical geopolitical power play with a prominent American,” Congressman Colin Allred (D-Tex.) said this week. “Americans and Britney fans should be prepared for this bogus trial and a trial that will result in the Russians finding her guilty and even convicting her.”
The US government “found that Brittney Greener was wrongfully detained and used as a political pawn,” her agent, Lindsey Kagawa Colas, said in a statement. “Negotiations for her immediate release regardless of court proceedings must remain a top priority and we expect.” [President Biden and administration officials] to do everything in their power right now to make a deal to bring her home.
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On Tuesday, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that the administration was “actively engaged” in trying to resolve the case and secure Greener’s release.
Russia experts have long viewed Griner’s detention and court proceedings as ploys to gain leverage for a possible prisoner swap, and Russia’s target in exchange for Griner is believed to be arms dealer Viktor Bout, who is serving a 25-year sentence for conspiracy to kill American citizens and providing aid to a terrorist organization. In April, despite strained relations, the United States and Russia agreed to a prisoner swap that freed former US Marine Trevor Reed after nearly three years in Russian custody.
“They’re looking for leverage,” Fried said of Russia’s handling of Griner. “In any case where there is an official [Russian] interest, the system tends to bend to that official interest. Her fate will be decided politically.”
Little is publicly known about Griner’s condition or treatment at the hands of Russian authorities. In an interview Wednesday on the SiriusXM radio show “Keepin’ It Real with Al Sharpton,” Greiner’s wife, Cherelle, said the couple had not yet spoken since the Feb. 17 arrest, but that she had received letters from Greiner.
“She tells me she’s fine,” Cheryl Greener said. “She’s like, ‘I’m fine, honey. I’m hardened. It’s not me right now. When I get home, it will take me a minute to come back to myself. But I behave. I won’t break until I get home. I won’t let them break me.”
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