headlines: Witnesses testify in Brittney Griner’s defense as her drug trial continues in Russia.
articles: Witnesses for the defense praised Brittney Griner’s athletic prowess and character on Thursday in a courtroom outside Moscow, where the American basketball star — now one of the world’s most famous prisoners — is facing a possible 10-year sentence on drug charges.
  
  Maksim Ryabkov, the director of UMMC Yekaterinburg, the professional Russian team that Ms. Griner has played for, testified to her “outstanding abilities as a player and personal contribution to the strengthening the team’s spirit,” said Ms. Griner’s lawyer, Maria Blagovolina, a partner with the firm Rybalkin, Gortsunyan, Dyakin and Partners.
  
  Ms. Griner’s trial resumed a week after she pleaded guilty to drug charges. The Russian authorities accused her of having a vape cartridge with hashish oil in her luggage at an airport near Moscow on Feb. 17, where she had traveled to play with UMMC Yekaterinburg during the W.N.B.A. off-season. In the Russian justice system, trials go on even when defendants plead guilty, but Ms. Griner’s lawyers have said they hoped her plea would make the court more lenient.