Brittney Griner Had Prescription for Drug She Delivered to Russia, Legal professionals Say

Brittney Griner’s legal professionals argued on Friday that the American basketball star had a medical prescription for the drug that she mistakenly carried into Russia, the place she has been detained for practically 5 months amid Moscow’s escalating tensions with Washington over the conflict in Ukraine.

As Ms. Griner’s trial on drug prices resumed at a courtroom exterior Moscow, her protection staff supplied medical paperwork displaying that she had a prescription for medical hashish for persistent ache, in keeping with Reuters.

The Russian authorities accused Ms. Griner in February of getting two vape cartridges with cannabis oil — a hashish spinoff — in her baggage at an airport close to Moscow. The 31-year-old Phoenix Mercury star and two-time Olympic gold medalist had traveled there to play with UMMC Yekaterinburg, a Russian staff, throughout the W.N.B.A. low season.

She was charged with willfully smuggling the vape cartridges, violating Russian legal guidelines prohibiting the import of narcotics.

Ms. Griner pleaded guilty last week, telling the choose she had “no intent” to interrupt the legislation. Within the Russian justice system, the trial course of continues even after defendants plead responsible.

Her legal professionals have argued that she had packed in a rush. On the listening to on Friday, they supplied proof together with “a physician’s appointment for the substance that, resulting from an oversight of B.G., remained amongst her belongings when crossing the border,” in keeping with a press release from Maria Blagovolina, a companion within the legislation agency Rybalkin, Gortsunyan, Dyakin and Companions.

Ms. Griner has discovered herself caught within the rising acrimony between the Kremlin and the Biden administration, which has pledged to do every part it could possibly to safe her freedom. Going through a potential 10-year sentence if convicted, in a justice system that closely favors the prosecution, Ms. Griner has expressed fear that she could by no means be freed, and wrote in a recent letter to President Biden: “Please don’t neglect about me.”

Her case has galvanized help within the American sports activities world and past. As she sat behind bars within the courtroom on Friday, Ms. Griner, clad in a Nirvana T-shirt, held up a photograph of W.N.B.A. gamers wearing her number throughout final week’s All-Star Sport in Chicago.

Her legal professionals additionally submitted proof together with commendations from Russian and U.S. organizations. A day earlier, the director of UMMC Yekaterinburg, the staff physician and a fellow participant testified in her protection, praising her athletic means and character.

Regardless of rising stress for america to make a deal to free Ms. Griner, presumably by way of a prisoner trade, Russian officers have performed down the potential of an imminent decision, and insisted that no negotiations may happen till the authorized proceedings are completed.