Brittney Griner, a WNBA star incarcerated for attempting to bring a small amount of hashish oil onto a domestic flight with her Russian Premier League team, faces nine years
in a Russian penal colony. Last month, the Russian authorities dismissed her request for release. Griner received further bad news this week;
her attorneys informed People magazine that she will serve her time in a "general regime jail," which is the "most severe category of female correctional camps."
Even if many are sent to one of the 106 "mixed gender low-security settlement correctional camps," People reports that this is not an uncommon sentence in Russia.
Griner's drug conviction requires her to do her time in one of the 35 maximum-security prisons. "Life in a general regime colony is much more difficult than in a settlement colony,"
Natalia Filimonovna of the NGO Russia Behind Bars told People. In the wake of his party's unexpectedly strong performance in Tuesday's midterm elections, President Joe Biden
reaffirmed his "determination" to free Griner earlier this week. The U.S. president expressed hope that the results of the midterm elections would prompt the Russians to take negotiations
"more seriously." Russia has not issued an official statement regarding Griner's new location for serving her sentence.