RebKell's Junkie Boards

[ChicagoAnnie]

I just learned that another American, a Texas man was arrested by Russian authorities in January 2022. He flew there to retrieve his children after his ex-wife fled the US with them. He still doesn't have a trial date. BG's misfortune a month later became a bigger bargaining chip for Russia.

https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1543940980897988609

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The meteor cannot come fast enough. Start this thing over.

[scullyfu]

Did anyone catch BG’s wife Cherelle on CBS Morning today? It was at about the 7:30 mark, maybe a little after, I think.

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i'll always bleed Storm green.

[CalwbbFan]

More on the “Russian legal system” from Deadline Whitehouse: https://twitter.com/deadlinewh/status/1544468754679095296?s=21&t=baFXspyHu_6aBC_v9AktAg

[pilight]

So it's similar to the American legal system

_________________
I'm a lonely frog
I ain't got a home

[Bob Lamm]

[CalwbbFan]

[StevenHW]

[Ex-Ref]

Biden spoke with BG's wife.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2022/07/06/biden-speaks-wife-brittney-griner-drafts-letter-wnba-star/7821626001/

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"Women are judged on their success, men on their potential. It’s time we started believing in the potential of women." —Muffet McGraw

“Thank you for showing the fellas that you've got more balls than them,” Haley said, to cheers from the crowd.

[WfanFrJmp]

So happy to hear that he finally spoke with Cherelle. I hope and pray that it's not performative and they truly do what they need to do to get her home.

[johnjohnW]

[Bob Lamm]

[hyperetic]

What's aggravating to me is that some clueless people are referencing the LiAngelo Ball/China situation to say that if "he" was still president BG would already be home. SMDH...

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https://www.facebook.com/tonyboydphotography

[WfanFrJmp]

[johnjohnW]

[Bob Lamm]

[ChicagoAnnie]

[johnjohnW]

[jammerbirdi]

Brittney Griner’s trial resumes as a Russian diplomat criticizes U.S. ‘hype’ over her case.


By Anton Troianovski
July 7, 2022
Updated 6:30 a.m. ET

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/07/world/europe/brittney-griner-trial.html

A top Russian diplomat lashed out at the Biden administration on Thursday for trying to “foment hype” around the case of the detained American basketball star Brittney Griner, hours before her trial was expected to resume in a court near Moscow.

The diplomat, Sergei A. Ryabkov, the deputy foreign minister, said that the publicity around Ms. Griner’s case — American officials say she is essentially a hostage taken by President Vladimir V. Putin amid the war in Ukraine — was not helping her interests.

Mr. Ryabkov indicated that Moscow would be prepared to negotiate her fate, but only after the court reached a verdict on the drug charges that were brought against her. She has been detained in Russia since Feb. 17, accused by the Russian authorities of having a vape cartridge with hashish oil in her luggage at an airport near Moscow.

“We have a long-established form of discussing these matters,” Mr. Ryabkov told reporters on Thursday in Moscow, according to the Interfax news agency. “The American side’s attempts to foment hype and make noise in the public environment are understandable, but they don’t help to practically resolve issues.”

If Ms. Griner is convicted, she faces up to 10 years in a Russian penal colony.

After her trial began last week, she sent a handwritten letter to Mr. Biden asking him not to “forget about” her and other American detainees overseas.

Mr. Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris spoke on Wednesday with Ms. Griner’s wife, Cherelle Griner, according to a statement released by the White House.

During the call, the statement said, the president read a draft of a letter that he planned to send to Brittney Griner. He also said that his administration was pursuing “every avenue to bring Brittney home.”

Cherelle Griner has publicly expressed frustration with Mr. Biden and his administration’s efforts to secure her wife’s release.

In a statement to The New York Times on Wednesday, Cherelle Griner said she was grateful to Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris “for the time they spent with me and for the commitment they expressed to getting B.G. home.”

The United States government has classified Brittney Griner as “wrongfully detained” and is working to secure her release regardless of the outcome of the trial. While the Kremlin claims it has no involvement in Ms. Griner’s case, Russian state media reports have indicated that Moscow may press the United States to free a Russian in American custody — like the convicted arms dealer Viktor Bout — in exchange for her freedom.

Mr. Ryabkov said that until the conclusion of Ms. Griner’s case, “there are no formal procedural grounds” to discuss further steps. He hinted, however, that Moscow was interested in negotiating over her fate, claiming that she would be helped by “a serious reading by the American side of the signals that they received from Russia, from Moscow, through specialized channels.”

He did not specify what those signals were, but insisted that talks on Ms. Griner’s fate should take place out of the public eye, according to Russian news reports.

“Hype and publicity, for all the love for this genre among modern politicians, only gets in the way in this particular instance,” Mr. Ryabkov said, according to the RIA Novosti news agency. “This does not just distract from the case, but creates interference in the truest sense of the word. That’s why silence is needed here.”

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Every woman who has ever been presented with a career/sex quid pro quo in the entertainment industry should come forward and simply say, “Me, too.” - jammer The New York Times 10/10/17

[BamaEd]

https://www.espn.com/wnba/story/_/id/34205952/detained-wnba-star-brittney-griner-pleads-guilty-drug-charges-russia

Detained WNBA star Brittney Griner pleaded guilty on Thursday to bringing hashish oil into Russia, telling a judge that she had done so "inadvertently" while asking the court for mercy.

The move is not expected to end her trial in Khimki, Russia, anytime soon. Even with a guilty plea in Russian criminal courts, the judge will continue to read the full case file into the record and it could still go on for weeks or months

[Hawkeye]

And of course she isn't given the proper respect from the US Chief of Mission in Moscow, Elizabeth Rood. She referred to her as Ms. Griner when she is married. She should be referred to as Mrs. Griner...but then she's married to a woman and not a man, so there ya go.

[CalwbbFan]

“ Given the 99% conviction rate in Russia, Griner likely sees this as her only chance of leniency from a potential 10-year sentence.

If she were truly guilty, however, she likely would have pleaded a long time ago to strike a deal.”

My thoughts exactly: https://twitter.com/adriennelaw/status/1545072307642609667?s=21&t=yeQDjT2AyERczmFWkmmINQ

[FrozenLVFan]

[johnjohnW]

[Bob Lamm]

[pilight]

The public pressure must be having an effect. Otherwise Ryabkov wouldn't have mentioned it.

_________________
I'm a lonely frog
I ain't got a home