Russia freed Brittney Griner on Thursday, and edited video released by Russian state media shows the moment the WNBA star is exchanged for notorious arms dealer Viktor Bout at an airport in Abu Dhabi..
Bout walks toward the camera after the exchange, accompanied by two men whose faces are blurred. Griner peels off to the left, also accompanied, and is greeted by about a half-dozen people.
In another video, Griner is seen boarding and then leaving a van, and then boarding a plane. In the video, also edited, Griner shows her passport and then she is seen sitting on the plane. Asked her mood, she says: "Happy."
She says she is unsure where the plane is headed.
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Brittney Grinner
Who is "The Merchant of Death," Viktor Bout?
In releasing Bout, the U.S. freed a former Soviet Army lieutenant colonel whom the Justice Department once described as one of the world's most prolific arms dealers. He was arrested in Thailand in 2008 and extradited to the U.S. in 2010.
Bout was serving a 25-year sentence on charges that he conspired to sell tens of millions of dollars in weapons that U.S officials said were to be used against Americans. Bout had served 11 years of his 25-year prison sentence and was scheduled for release in August 2029. Biden issued an executive grant of clemency to free the arms dealer from a federal prison in Illinois to effect the prisoner swap.
Biden’s authorization to release Bout, the Russian felon once nicknamed “the Merchant of Death,” underscored the heightened urgency that his administration faced to get Griner home, particularly after the recent resolution of her criminal case on drug charges and her subsequent transfer to a penal colony. Griner, who also played pro basketball in Russia, was arrested at an airport there after Russian authorities said she was carrying vape canisters with cannabis oil.
What is Brittney Griner known for?
Griner is a two-time Olympic gold medalist, Baylor University All-American and Phoenix Mercury pro basketball star, whose arrest made her the most high-profile American jailed abroad. Her status as an openly gay Black woman, locked up in a country where authorities have been hostile to the LBGTQ community, injected racial, gender and social dynamics into her legal saga and brought unprecedented attention to the population of wrongful detainees.
