Brittney Griner pleaded guilty to bringing hashish oil into Russia on Thursday, telling a judge she had done so “inadvertently” while pleading with the court for leniency.
The move is not expected to end his trial in Khimki, Russia, any time soon. Even with a guilty plea in Russian criminal courts, the judge will continue to read the entire case file in the registry and could still go on for weeks or months.
“I would like to plead guilty, your honor. But there was no intention. I didn’t want to break the law,” Griner was quoted as saying by Reuters, speaking in English that was later translated into Russian for the court.
Sources said the guilty plea was a ploy to help facilitate a prisoner swap that could bring Griner home, and it was also an acknowledgment that there was no way she could be acquitted.
US officials and Russia experts have described the trial on drug smuggling charges as “theater,” with a guilty verdict seen as a foregone conclusion.
Thursday was the second day of her trial on charges that she tried to bring vape cartridges containing hashish oil into Russia on February 17, where she was detained by customs officials at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport.
There is no timetable, but the actual resolution of the Griner case is expected to be a deal that brings one or more Russians currently in US custody to Russia in exchange for the release of Griner and possibly another American, Paul Whelan, who has been detained in Russia since December 2018.
Russia has requested the release of an arms dealer named Viktor Bout, who is serving a 25-year sentence in the United States for supporting terrorism. But sources have said there are voices in the Biden administration that have opposed releasing Bout, known by his nickname, “the merchant of death.”
Pundits have said that any deal to free Griner would almost certainly require an admission of guilt by the American star, regardless of the facts. By pleading guilty at trial, a source familiar with the strategy said, Griner takes that out of the way. And while she might complicate the public’s reaction to her case, a source said the idea was to get her home as much as possible and deal with the fallout for her when she returns.
