Sources: Griner deemed ‘wrongfully detained’

The US government now believes WNBA star Brittney Griner was wrongfully detained by the Russian government, signaling a significant change in how officials will try to bring her home, sources familiar with the matter told ESPN. with your case.

Officials and other sources close to Griner’s case declined to say what led to the change or if there were discussions about what it would take to secure his release.

“Brittney has been held for 75 days and our expectation is that the White House will do whatever it takes to bring her home,” Griner’s agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, said in a statement to ESPN on Tuesday.

The change in official designation means the US government will no longer wait for Griner’s case to play out in the Russian legal system and will seek to negotiate his return. It also means that Griner’s fellow WNBA players and supporters in Congress will be told that they have the family’s blessing to bring as much attention to her case as they wish.

“We feel really good about it,” said a source close to Griner. “But we also know that it can be prolonged, so we don’t want to set our expectations too high.”

A source close to Griner also confirmed Monday that former US Ambassador to the United Nations Bill Richardson, who has worked privately for years as an international hostage negotiator, agreed to work on Griner’s case last week. Experts have said Richardson’s involvement would be a crucial sign that his case has moved into a new arena.

Until now, Griner’s personal team had followed State Department advice to keep a low profile so as not to make her a more valuable asset to Vladimir Putin’s government.

Contacted Monday night, a State Department official sent ESPN a statement that read: “The State Department has determined that the Russian Federation has wrongfully detained United States citizen Brittney Griner. With this determination, the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs, Roger Carstens, will lead the interagency team to secure the release of Brittney Griner.”

The official said that does not mean Griner is considered a hostage, which is a different legal classification than wrongfully detained.

Sources close to Griner said they were not told why she was reclassified, but were told Saturday morning that her case had been transferred to the special envoy’s office.

Until last weekend, his case had been handled by the consular office, which monitors the cases of any American detained abroad without necessarily intervening. State Department officials notified the appropriate congressional committees of the change on Monday.

Griner’s team turned optimistic about his fate last week with the release of former US Marine Trevor Reed, who had been detained in Russia since 2019.

Reed was basically swapped for a Russian citizen who had been convicted of drug dealing. The deal was a sign that despite Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, there remains an open diplomatic channel between US and Russian officials.

Richardson was active in securing Reed’s release. Another American, Paul Whelan, remains in detention in Russia after more than two years.

Griner, who plays during the WNBA offseason for a Russian team, was arrested in February at a Moscow-area airport while entering the country. Russian prosecutors said she illegally brought in vape cartridges containing hashish oil.

Griner has not been formally charged, but has a hearing scheduled for May 19. The fact that the US government now regards Griner as wrongfully detained does not mean that Russia will change its official stance on her detention, but it does mean that the US views legal proceedings as irrelevant to her case. .

The WNBA said Tuesday it would keep Griner “at the forefront of what we do” this season with a decal on the floor of the 12-team home court. The decal will feature Griner’s initials along with his number, 42.

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Sources: Griner deemed ‘wrongfully detained’