American basketball star Brittney Griner’s detention in Russia extended until May

Brittney Griner’s detention in Russia for the possession of vape cartridges containing hashish oil has been extended until May 19th, according to the Russian state news agency, Tass.

Tass reported that a court in the Moscow region on Thursday ruled the US basketball star should be detained for at least two more months.

“The court granted the petition of the investigation and extended the term of US citizen Griner’s detention until May 19th,” Tass quoted the court as saying.

Ekaterina Kalugina, a member of Public Monitoring Commission, a semi-official body with access to Russian prisons, told Tass that Griner was sharing a cell with two other women with no previous convictions. Kalugina added that Griner’s only issue was that the prison beds were too short for her 6ft 9in frame.

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A person close to the situation confirmed that Thursday’s hearing was solely about Griner’s legal team challenging her detention, and not on the merits of the case, with the hope of getting the double Olympic champion transferred to house arrest. The court’s denial of that appeal was not unexpected, the person said.

The investigation is still ongoing and a trial date will be set once it has concluded. Until then, the court extends detention by periods of time. If the investigation is not finished by the May hearing, the court will then contemplate how much longer the court needs to extend.

The source also confirmed on Thursday that Griner is “OK” and her Russian legal team has seen her multiple times a week over the entire course of her detention.

Without identifying Griner, who has won two Olympic golds with Team USA, the Russian Customs Service said earlier this month that a player had been detained in February after arriving at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport on a flight from New York.

The 31-year-old WNBA star faces up to 10 years in prison if found guilty of bringing drugs into Russia. Griner’s arrest comes as the US places sanctions on Russia after Vladimir Putin ordered his forces to invade Ukraine last month.

“If we want her out of jail, Russia is going to have some terms,” said Evelyn Farkas, who served as the US deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia and Ukraine from 2012 to 2015. “It could be a prisoner swap. They also could use it as an implicit threat or blackmail to get us to do something or not do something. Either way, they find it useful.”

A former Pentagon official told Yahoo Sports she feared Griner could become a “high-profile hostage”.

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has said the Biden administration has assigned an embassy team to work on Griner’s case.

In a statement last week, Griner's agent Lindsay Colas said: "We are aware of the situation with Brittney Griner in Russia and are in close contact with her, her legal representation in Russia, her family, her teams, and the WNBA and NBA.

“As this is an ongoing legal matter, we are not able to comment further on the specifics of her case but can confirm that as we work to get her home, her mental and physical health remain our primary concern.”

Griner, like many of her fellow WNBA players, also competes in Russia during the league’s offseason. She has played for UMMC Ekaterinburg since 2015, helping the Russian club to three domestic titles and EuroLeague Women championships in 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2021. Her annual salary of $1m with Ekaterinburg is far in excess of her earnings in the WNBA, where the maximum salary is $228,000.

Griner is considered one of the best players in the world. She won gold medals with Team USA at the 2016 and 2020 Olympics, the WNBA title with the Phoenix Mercury in 2014 and has been named an WNBA All-Star seven times.

- Guardian