It’s been 8 months since Russia wrongfully detained Brittney Griner for having vape cartridges with hashish oil.
In the time since Griner has been sentenced to 9 years in prison. Her family and supporters have constantly called for her release to no avail. No progress has been made. The US government offered to swap prisoners with Russia, but it didn’t work. Griner and her lawyers tried to appeal her sentence, but it was denied.
Now, Griner’s wrongful imprisonment is going to get even worse.
Russia has begun the process of moving Griner to a penal colony, according to reporting from ESPN’s T.J. Quinn. Her family has no idea where she is right now or where she’s being moved to and notification can take weeks.
This is horrifying — plain and simple. This puts Griner is some very real and potentially life-threatening danger.
Let’s look at the details.
Wait, so Griner is being moved to a penal colony?
Yes. As of last Friday, according to Quinn’s reporting, Griner has been on the move. And much faster than typically anticipated.
Normally, it’d take weeks to process a prisoner’s move to a penal colony. Griner’s happened just a day after a visit from U.S. embassy officials and two weeks after her denied appeal.
“The transfer began Friday, her lawyers said, a day after U.S. embassy officials visited her and far ahead of the schedule they had anticipated after Griner’s appeal was denied Oct. 25. Typically, her attorneys had said, a transfer takes weeks or months. Griner’s attorneys and U.S. officials were not aware she had been moved until Tuesday.”
No, that’s not normal.
So what exactly is a penal colony, anyway?
It’s essentially a labor camp. Russian penal colonies are the direct successors of the Stalin-era Gulags that were used to imprison people from the 1920s to the 1950s.
Here’s how NBC News described what Griner is going into.
“Human rights violations are a regular feature of many of the camps, according to the U.S. State Department, human rights groups and others who have maintained regular contact with prisoners in Russia.”
The labor is grueling and torturous. The conditions are inhumane. The circumstances are fraught. It’s just an all-around dangerous situation.
Wait, things are that bad?
Yes. And, for Griner, they’re probably worse. She is a Black, gay American woman who is being imprisoned over drug possession.
“Russian prisons are grim, even relative to prisons in other countries. And the Putin regime has ramped up hostility towards gays and lesbians as part of its broader policy of hard-line nationalism,” Muriel Atkin, a Russian history professor at George Washington University, told NBC News.
They aren’t going to make things easy for Griner at all.
My goodness. Is there anything being done about this?
Honestly, it’s hard to say. Mostly because everyone is literally just finding out about this.
Griner’s family and her representation have no idea where she is right now and it could take weeks for them to find out because official notice of this sort of move only comes through the mail in Russia.
What Griner’s agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, is asking for is public support in “continuing to write letters and express their love and care for her” despite things being up in the air right now.
The WNBA Player’s Association is asking for the same thing.
The Women's National Basketball Players Association's Statement Regarding Brittney Griner's Transfer to Russian Penal Colony. pic.twitter.com/mQg0kJ57I3
— WNBPA (@TheWNBPA) November 9, 2022
Why is that so important?
People have to keep tweeting. Keep writing. Keep sending support. That puts pressure on officials to move and get something done.
It also may keep Griner’s hope up and spirit strong which, seeing where she’s going now, she’ll need lots of that. She needs to know that she has not been forgotten and that people are still fighting for her. Her spirit cannot break. If it does, that could mean life or death. Nobody wants to see that.
In the meantime, Colas said, Griner’s team is in contact with both the U.S. government and the Richardson Center —which is a private firm that works to bring detained Americans home — to try and nail down Griner’s location.
The more time that passes, the direr the situation becomes. Hopefully, they can find her and bring her home soon.
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