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WNBA Star Britney Griner Pleads Guilty to Drug Possession in Russian Court

Her guilty plea came one day after Pres. Joe Biden and Vice Pres. Kamala Harris spoke to Griner’s wife, Cherelle Griner, who had complained that the president had not been in touch with her or other members of the basketball star’s family. She revealed the contents of a hand-written letter Brittney wrote to the president on national news networks on July 4.

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Photo of Britney Griner by Lorie Shaull / Wikimedia Commons
Photo of Britney Griner by Lorie Shaull / Wikimedia Commons

By Post Staff

WNBA champion Brittney Griner entered a guilty plea for possession of hashish oil cartridges on Thursday as part of what some legal experts assert is a strategy for a lighter sentence.

Accused of large-scale drug transportation, she has been detained since Feb. 17, 2022. She was in possession of .07 grams of hashish oil. The charges carry a 10-year sentence.

“I’d like to plead guilty, your honor. But there was no intent. I didn’t want to break the law,” Griner said on the second day of her trial, according to Reuters.

Her guilty plea came one day after Pres. Joe Biden and Vice Pres. Kamala Harris spoke to Griner’s wife, Cherelle Griner, who had complained that the president had not been in touch with her or other members of the basketball star’s family. She revealed the contents of a hand-written letter Brittney wrote to the president on national news networks on July 4.

“(As) I sit here in a Russian prison, alone with my thoughts and without the protection of my wife, family, friends, Olympic jersey, or any accomplishments, I’m terrified I might be here forever,” a portion of the 31-year-old’s letter read.

The prolonged silence from the U.S. government for much of her imprisonment raised questions in the African American community that perhaps the Black, gay woman was not important enough.

Rev. Al Sharpton had been advocating for a group of Americans go to Russia to offer prayer and solace for the two-time Olympic gold medalist who was there to play with the Russian Premier League during WNBA’s off season.

On learning of her guilty plea, Sharpton said “I still support Brittney Griner and pray that her plea of guilty is met w/ mercy and leniency. (National Action Network) and I will continue to campaign for her return home, our concern for her life and safety remains.”

Tested for the presence of drugs in her system, Griner was clean, giving rise to speculation that her arrest at a Moscow airport one week before Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24 was politically motivated.

Diplomacy experts agree, asserting that Griner is considered a pawn in a test of wills between Russian Pres. Vladmir Putin and Western powers including and especially the U.S.

Possible next steps after her trial, which will last several more weeks, is the possibility of a prisoner swap where a Russian national detained in the U.S. will be traded for Griner’s release.

Reuters, ESPN, Slate magazine, CNN and USA Today were sources for this story.

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Bay Area

A Spike in Youth Violence Prompts School District, City Hall to Take Action

In response to series of violent incidents that recently occurred on and off school campuses, the San Francisco Unified School District and city officials introduced a slew of proposals on Tuesday to mitigate youth violence in San Francisco. Last week, the school district was hit with reports of a gun at a middle school campus and a stabbing at another.

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San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) logo. (Photo courtesy of the San Francisco Unified School District)
San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) logo. (Photo courtesy of the San Francisco Unified School District)

By Olivia Wynkoop
Bay City News

In response to series of violent incidents that recently occurred on and off school campuses, the San Francisco Unified School District and city officials introduced a slew of proposals on Tuesday to mitigate youth violence in San Francisco.

Last week, the school district was hit with reports of a gun at a middle school campus and a stabbing at another.

And off campus — a 12-year-old was arrested last week for allegedly stabbing a 15-year-old highschooler on a MUNI bus, and police said they are adding more patrols at Stonestown Galleria on Monday after several large teen fights broke out at the mall.

“There are no excuses for violence, but there are steps we can take to prevent this kind of behavior from taking hold in our schools and our City,” said Mayor London Breed. “As City leaders, we are committed to working together with the School District to make sure our kids are safe and have the support they need, especially after the incredible strain on our young people caused by the last few years.”

The nine proposals released on Tuesday would beef up pre-existing city and school programs, like adding more MUNI transit ambassadors, expanding a school violence interrupter program to identify at-risk youth and coordinate rehabilitation programs for youth involved in crime in the city’s district attorney and public defender offices.

“As SFUSD’s superintendent and a parent, I recognize how challenging the last few weeks have been,” said Superintendent Matt Wayne. “I am grateful that SFUSD and City leaders have come together with a sense of urgency to find solutions, and deepen our partnerships so that we can better support SFUSD students and families.”

The school district also said it intends to improve mental health support, resource-sharing and coordination techniques in school violence incidents.

“Our youth are still recovering from the devastating effect of the pandemic, and we know that it will take the entire City family, which includes leveraging the expertise of our community-based organizations, to help them build up their social-emotional resilience,” said Dr. Maria Su, Executive Director of the Department of Children, Youth, and Their Families.

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BayCityNews

Newsom Unveils Restorative, Rehabilitative Vision for San Quentin Prison

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday unveiled his plan to transform San Quentin State Prison into a facility that emphasizes services and support over punishment, dubbing the new model the San Quentin Rehabilitation Center. The governor joined former and current prison staff and inmates, elected officials, and criminal justice reform advocates for a news conference on Friday at the prison announcing the project, which some are calling a Scandinavian approach to incarceration.

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Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during a media briefing at Ruby Bridges Elementary School in Alameda, Calif., on March 16, 2021. (Eli Walsh/Bay City News)
Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during a media briefing at Ruby Bridges Elementary School in Alameda, Calif., on March 16, 2021. (Eli Walsh/Bay City News)

By Katy St. Clair
Bay City News

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday unveiled his plan to transform San Quentin State Prison into a facility that emphasizes services and support over punishment, dubbing the new model the San Quentin Rehabilitation Center.

The governor joined former and current prison staff and inmates, elected officials, and criminal justice reform advocates for a news conference on Friday at the prison announcing the project, which some are calling a Scandinavian approach to incarceration.

“I don’t refer to it as a Scandinavian model,” said Newsom on Friday when asked about the comparison. “This is the California model. The California way, informed by best practices across the globe.”

Newsom said he hopes to make San Quentin “the preeminent restorative justice facility in the world.”

Under the new plan, San Quentin would only hold about 2,000 inmates who are serving lesser sentences and it would move more than 500 inmates doing more time for greater offenses, including those on death row, to other facilities.

The transition would take place by 2025, Newsom said, and he has pledged $20 million toward it.

The so-called Scandinavian model emphasizes education, training and rehabilitation over punishment, with the idea that people shouldn’t leave prison worse than when they came in. Newsom said that some approaches have already begun in smaller prisons throughout the state but this one would be the largest in scale.

At San Quentin under the new model, prisoners will be able to learn lucrative trades to better their chances of making it when they get out. This means inmates can study to become plumbers, electricians or truck drivers.

Currently, San Quentin already has its own college program, an award-winning inmate-produced newspaper, and several other opportunities for enrichment.

State Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, shared his support as well for the new direction.

“We have put politics above smart policy when it comes to our criminal justice system,” he said. “Today’s action by Newsom isn’t just about reform. It’s about changing lives. It’s about ending the prison pipeline that’s impacted California’s communities of color. It’s about creating a pathway for entire families and a stronger future for this state. And it’s about saving taxpayers money.”

At the core for the need for a new approach, said both McGuire and the governor, is the state’s 70 percent recidivism rate. And while he said his office was merely looking at worldwide models of reform and would create its own model, he cited Norway’s 20 percent recidivism rate as an argument for restorative justice over simply warehousing people.

Asked what challenges he faces in implementing the new model, Newsom replied jocularly.

“Fires, droughts, social unrest, pandemics?” he quipped, adding “Ron Desantis?”

He then got serious.

“Interested people find excuses. Committed people find ways of getting things done,” he said.

Assemblymember Phil Ting, D-San Francisco/San Mateo, spoke at the news conference in support of the program.

“For a couple of decades, we had this idea that as a state we could be safer,” he said. “If we put our inmates in the most remote parts of the state, if we could just send them out, separate them from their communities, separate them from us, separate them from their loved ones and from family members, that somehow we would be safer.

“Actually I think the exact opposite is needed,” Ting said.

San Quentin, which sits on prime Marin real estate facing the Bay, is California’s oldest prison and was once home to the nation’s largest death row. It currently houses about 3,300 inmates.

In 2019, Newsom placed a moratorium on executions in the state and ordered that the death chamber at San Quentin be dismantled.

Copyright © 2023 Bay City News, Inc.  All rights reserved.  Republication, rebroadcast or redistribution without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Bay City News is a 24/7 news service covering the greater Bay Area.

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Community

Biden Issues Another Executive Order Seeking to Curb Gun Violence

As he visited Monterey Park, California, on Tuesday, President Joe Biden lamented that every few days in the United States, the country mourns a new mass shooting. Biden argued that daily acts of gun violence, including community violence, domestic violence, suicide, and accidental shootings, may not always make the evening news. Still, they cut lives short and leave survivors and their communities with long-lasting physical and mental wounds.

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Before the President met with the families and victims of the Star Ballroom Dance Studio shooting on January 21, which killed 11 people and injured nine others, he signed an executive order to stop gun violence and make the country’s neighborhoods safer.
Before the President met with the families and victims of the Star Ballroom Dance Studio shooting on January 21, which killed 11 people and injured nine others, he signed an executive order to stop gun violence and make the country’s neighborhoods safer.

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia

As he visited Monterey Park, California, on Tuesday, President Joe Biden lamented that every few days in the United States, the country mourns a new mass shooting.

Biden argued that daily acts of gun violence, including community violence, domestic violence, suicide, and accidental shootings, may not always make the evening news.

Still, they cut lives short and leave survivors and their communities with long-lasting physical and mental wounds.

Before the President met with the families and victims of the Star Ballroom Dance Studio shooting on January 21, which killed 11 people and injured nine others, he signed an executive order to stop gun violence and make the country’s neighborhoods safer.

Also, the President told U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland to ensure that the laws already in place about background checks are followed.

Biden also told Garland to clarify that part of the law that says who has to do background checks because some gun dealers might not know that they fall under that part of the law.

“We cannot accept these facts as the enduring reality of life in America,” Biden asserted.

“Instead, we must together insist that we have had enough and that we will no longer allow the interests of the gun manufacturers to win out over the safety of our children and nation.”

He said his administration’s policy remains that executive departments and agencies would pursue “every legally available and appropriate action to reduce gun violence.”

“Through this whole-of-government approach, my administration has made historic progress to save lives,” the President asserted.

“My administration has taken action to keep guns out of dangerous hands and especially dangerous weapons off of our streets; hold gun traffickers and rogue gun dealers accountable; fund accountable, effective community policing; and invest in community violence interventions and prevention strategies.”

Biden has taken several steps that he hoped would stop the mass shootings that have become common in the United States.

Administration officials said it’s up to Congress to act.

“Few policy ideas are more popular among the American people than universal background checks, but Congress refuses to act,” a senior administration official stated.

“This move will mean fewer guns will be sold without background checks, and therefore fewer guns will end up in the hands of felons and domestic abusers.”

Meanwhile, Biden called on his cabinet to act, including educating the public on “red flag” laws and addressing firearm thefts.

Already, the President was able to get the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act through Congress.

According to the White House, this law gives communities new tools to fight gun violence, such as better background checks for people under the age of 21, money for extreme risk protection orders and other crisis interventions, and more mental health resources to help children who have been affected by gun violence heal from the grief and trauma it has caused.

“I continue to call on Congress to take additional action to reduce gun violence, including by banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, requiring background checks for all gun sales, requiring safe storage of firearms, funding my comprehensive Safer America Plan, and expanding community violence intervention and prevention strategies,” Biden continued.

“In the meantime, my administration will continue to do all that we can, within the existing authority, to make our communities safer.”

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