(Photo : NATALIA KOLESNIKOVA/AFP via Getty Images)
Brittney Griner sits inside a defendants' cage during a court hearing on July 15, 2022,. The WNBA star, in a new interview, says it was a "mistake" to leave cannabis oil cartridges in her luggage when traveling to Russia.
WNBA star blamed a "mental lapse" for her bringing cannabis oil cartridges in her luggage, a "mistake" that led to her spending nearly 10 months in a Russian prison.
Griner, 33, was arrested at Sheremetyevo International Airport outside Moscow on Feb. 17, 2022, for having the cannabis vaping cartridges, which are illegal in Russia, in her suitcase and was sentenced to nine years in prison.
"I could just visualize everything I worked so hard for just crumbling and going away," Griner told Robin Roberts in an interview that aired Wednesday evening on ABC's "20/20."
The two-time Olympic gold medalist who plays for the Phoenix Mercury said she was awakened late on the morning she was to travel to Russia during the WNBA's off-season and was in "panic mode."
"My packing at that moment was just throwing all my stuff in there and zipping it up and saying, 'OK, I'm ready,'" Griner said on the program.
She said she was devastated when she realized that she had forgotten the cartridges in her luggage after security asked to search her bags at the airport.
"I'm just like, 'Oh, my God.' Like, 'How did I - how did I make this mistake?'" Griner said.
"I could just visualize everything I worked so hard for just crumbling and going away," she added.
Roberts asked Griner about how some people were skeptical that she could have left the cartridges in her bags: "How did you not know?"
"It's just so easy to have a mental lapse," Griner said, noting that she had "no intention" of breaking the law.
"Granted, my mental lapse was on a more grand scale. But it doesn't take away from how that can happen," she added.
Griner was sentenced to nine years in prison on Aug. 4, 2022, and was sent to a prison in Mordovia, where she was put to work cutting fabric for Russian military uniforms.
"Really cold," Griner said of the conditions at the prison. "It's a work camp. You go there to work ... there's no rest."
She was released in December 2022 as part of a prisoner swap between Moscow and Washington, exchanging her for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who is known as the "Merchant of Death."
