Brittney Griner Being Transferred to Unkown Russian Penal Colony, Attorneys Say

Marisa Sullivan
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Brittney Griner is being transferred to a penal colony in Russia where she is set to begin her nine-year sentence for carrying cannabis oil into the country.

The U.S. women's basketball star, 32, was sentenced last month after being arrested in February at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport on "drug smuggling charges". President Biden had been trying to negotiate a deal to get Griner back on U.S. soil, saying she had been "wrongfully detained," but was denied, though the White House has continued to pursue efforts.

Griner "is now on her way to a penal colony," Griner's attorneys Maria Blagovolina and Alexander Boykov said in a statement on Wednesday. "We do not have any information on her exact current location or her final destination."

"In accordance with the standard Russian procedure, the attorneys, as well as the U.S. Embassy, should be notified upon her arrival at her destination. Notification is given via official mail and normally takes up to two weeks to be received."

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US basketball player Brittney Griner (R) is escorted by police before a hearing during her trial on charges of drug smuggling, in Khimki, outside Moscow on August 2, 2022. - Griner was detained at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport in February 2022 just days before Moscow launched its offensive in Ukraine. She was charged with drug smuggling for possessing vape cartridges with cannabis oil. Speaking at the trial on July 27, Griner said she still did not know how the cartridges ended up in her bag.

NATALIA KOLESNIKOVA/AFP via Getty Brittney Griner

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In a statement to PEOPLE following Griner's initial sentencing in August, her attorneys voiced that the verdict was "absolutely unreasonable" and said they will "certainly file an appeal."

However, after the appeal was rejected in October, Griner's lawyers told PEOPLE that she is "a very strong person" and "has a champion's character."

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"She of course has her highs and lows as she is severely stressed being separated from her loved ones for over eight months," they said.

Brittney Griner #42 and Brianna Turner #21 of the Phoenix Mercury
Brittney Griner #42 and Brianna Turner #21 of the Phoenix Mercury

Ethan Miller/Getty

The WNBA center's wife Cherelle Griner told CBS' Gayle King that the events have been playing out "like a movie" to her.

"I'm like, in no world did I ever thought, you know, our president and a foreign nation's president would be sitting down having to discuss the freedom of my wife," Cherelle expressed to King in an interview last month. "And so to me, as much as everybody's telling me a different definition of what BG is, it feels to me as if she's a hostage."

"It terrifies me, because when you watch movies, sometimes those situations don't end well," Cherelle added. "Sometimes they never get their person back."