The basketball player pleaded guilty on Thursday to bringing the oil into Russia while asking the court for mercy.
She is currently on trial in Russia. Even with a guilty plea in Russian criminal courts, the judge will continue to read the full case file into the record for weeks or months.
She accidentally packed the e-liquid at the airport and did not intend to break Russian law.
I would like to enter a guilty plea. There was no intention. I didn't want to break the law.
If she is found guilty of large-scale transportation of drugs, she could face up to 10 years in prison.
According to sources, the guilty plea was a strategy to help facilitate a prisoner swap that could bring her home, and it was also a recognition that there was no way she would be acquitted.
A guilty verdict is seen as a foregone conclusion in the trial of drug traffickers in the United States and Russia.
On the second day of her trial, she was charged with trying to bring a product into Russia that contained drugs.
The real resolution to the case is expected to be a deal that will bring one or more Russians currently in U.S. custody back to Russia in exchange for the release of the two Americans.
Viktor Bout is an arms dealer who is serving a 25-year sentence in the US for supporting terrorism. Sources say there are voices in the Biden Administration who don't want to release Bout.
The experts said that an admission of guilt by the American star would be required for a deal to be made. A source familiar with the strategy said that by pleading guilty during the trial, they were able to get that out of the way.
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