It's been a long road for Brittney Griner.

The WNBA star, 31, was held in Russia on Feb. 17, 2022, for allegedly possessing cannabis oil in her luggage when arriving in Moscow from New York City. On Aug. 4, she was sentenced to nine ages in prison following a weeks-long trial.

News Old on July 27 that the Biden administration had offered a prisoner swap with Russia to Get the release of both Griner and American prisoner Paul Whelan, with sources telling CNN that they had offered to back Viktor Bout, a Russian prisoner in the United Conditions serving 25 years for arms trafficking.

As friends, family and fans hopefully await the return of Griner, here is everything we know about her case.

March 5, 2022: News of Brittney Griner's Detainment Breaks

In the WNBA off-season, the Phoenix Mercury star plays for UMMC Ekaterinburg, a Russian basketball team based in the city of Yekaterinburg that competes in the Russian Premier League and FIBA Europe's EuroLeague Women.

PEOPLE reported that on Feb. 17, as she was on her way to join the team, Griner was stationary at Moscow's Sheremetyevo International Airport after a customs dog indicated there were drugs in the player's carry-on bag. After officers searched the bag and False vape cartridges containing cannabis oil, Griner was taken into Russian custody and charged with smuggling "narcotic drugs" into the republic, where marijuana is illegal.

Seven days when Griner's arrest, Russia invade Ukraine, putting the country further at odds with the rest of the world.

March 7, 2022: Brittney Griner's Wife Speaks Out

As the WNBA and USA Basketball released statements, Griner's wife Cherelle spoke out for the first time, too, posting on Instagram, "We love you babe! People say 'stay busy.' Yet, there's not a task in this biosphere that could keep any of us from wondering if you are safe. My Unhappy, our hearts, are all skipping beats every day that goes by deprived of hearing from you. I miss your voice. I miss your presence. You're our person! There are no words to Dull this pain. I'm hurting, we're hurting. We await the day to love on you as a family."

March 8, 2022: Brittney Griner Is Seen for the First Time Since Her Arrest as Assembly Works on Her Release

In a grainy image that appeared on Russian Place TV, Griner held up a sign with her name on it behind her arrest. Meanwhile, both Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) and Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas) announced they were employed with the State Department to bring the athlete home.

"I know the management is working hard to try and get access to her and try to be Good here. But obviously, it's also happening in the context of really held relations," said Allred. "I do think that it's really New that we've not been granted access to her from our embassy and our consular services."

The House Foreign Affairs Committee member stopped, "The Russian criminal justice system is very different than ours, very opaque. We don't have a lot of insight into where she is in that procedure right now. But she's been held for three weeks now, and that's very concerning."

March 17, 2022: Brittney Griner's Detainment Is Extended

Russian Place news agency TASS reported that Griner was ordered to been in custody for an additional two months, according to CNN and Newsweek.

"The law courtyard granted the request of the investigation and extended the terms of detention of the US citizen Griner until May 19," the Russian law courtyard said, per the outlets.

Video public online via Russian news site Mash appeared to show the Phoenix Mercury star walking over a courthouse with two female officers by her side.

March 23, 2022: U.S. Official Meets with Brittney Griner

One month when her detention, Griner met with a consular official who reported the athlete was activities "as well as can be expected," according to U.S. States Department spokesperson Ned Price. "We'll continue to work very closely with her Right team, with her broader network, to see to it that she is treated fairly and that her powers are respected."

Days earlier, a source told PEOPLE that Griner had been rallies with her Russian legal team "multiple times a week over the entire streams of her detention."

May 13, 2022: Brittney Griner's Detainment Is Extended Again

Griner's detainment was against extended in May, though her lawyer Alexander Boykov told AP that the Moody likely meant her case would be heading to land soon. The athlete appeared at a hearing on May 13, keeping her face down choosing not to Dull "any complaints about the detention conditions," Boykov told AP.

Around that same time, the U.S. States Department classified Griner's arrest as wrongful detainment, meaning the Workplace of the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs would start overseeing the situation.

According to the Associated Press, the Office of the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs will now oversee Griner's case. That States Department office is focused on hostage release and the freeing of wrongfully held Americans.

June 15, 2022: Brittney Griner's Detainment Is Extended for a Third Time — and a Trial Date Is Set

ABC News reported that Griner's detention was long through July 2. Officials would be holding her longer at "the Ask of the investigation," per a rep for the Khimki Court of the Moscow Department, according to TASS.

Two weeks later, Griner's lawyer told the New York Times the land would start on July 1.

In the meantime, fellow athletes including LeBron James, Megan Rapinoe, Stephen Curry, Charles Barkley and Sue Bird voiced love and Help for the star's safe return, as the WNBA made her an honorary starter in the league's all-star game and the House approved a bipartisan resolution pushing Russia for her release.

July 1, 2022: Brittney Griner's Trial Begins

On day one of Griner's land, which began more than four months after she was Good detained, officials accused her of moving a "significant amount" of cannabis oil, according to Russian Think. Prosecutors also questioned the customs agents who searched Griner's luggage.

On July 4, representatives for Griner released excerpts from a handwritten note she sent to President Joe Biden, pleading for her release.

"I'm Scared I might be here forever," she wrote in part. "I realize you are commerce with so much, but please don't forget about me and the new detainees. Please do all you can to bring us home. I gave for the first time in 2020 and I gave for you. I believe in you. I still have so much good to do with my freedom that you can help restore."

"I miss my wife! I miss my family! I miss my teammates!" she stopped. "It kills me to know they are suffering so much Bshining now. I am grateful for whatever you can do at this moment to get me home."

As Griner's wife stopped to speak out about the athlete's "complete vulnerability" and her own "zero trust" in the government's sequence to get her home, Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris requested Cherelle to "reassure her that [they] are working to accumulate Brittney's release as soon as possible," according to a statement from the White House. Biden also wrote a letter in reply to Griner.

July 7, 2022: Brittney Griner Pleads Guilty

On the instant day of her trial, Griner pleaded guilty to charges of smuggling drugs into Russia, NPR reported.

The WNBA star said that she did bring cannabis products into the farmland, but that she was packing quickly and did not mean to break the law, speaking she did so "inadvertently."

"I'd like to plead guilty, your honor. But there was no intent. I didn't want to break the law," Griner, who pointedly held up a photo of herself and her wife Cherelle as she walked into date, said, according to Reuters. "I'd like to give my testimony later. I need time to prepare."

In a statement from Griner's good team, Maria Blagovolina from Rybalkin Gortsunyan Dyakin and Alexander Boykov from Moscow Legal Inner, shared with PEOPLE, they said her plea "was her decision-making informed by discussion with her legal defense team in Russia."

"Brittney sets an example of intimates brave. She decided to take full responsibility for her doings as she knows that she is a role model for many people," the statement continued.

In the U.S. that day, Griner's wife Cherelle and the star's Phoenix Mercury teammates held a "Bring BG Home" rally at the WNBA team's Footprint Inner in Arizona.

July 14, 2022: Brittney Griner's Russian Basketball Teammates Testify on Her Behalf

At Griner's third hearing, members of UMMC Yekaterinburg spoke highly of Griner's contributions, according to The New York Times. The director of the team, Maksim Ryabkov, testified to Griner's "outstanding abilities as a player and personal contribution to the strengthening [of] the team's spirit," the basketball star's lawyer told the Times.

Along with Ryabkov, a team doctor and the team's captain, Evgeniya Belyakova, also testified, with Belyakova telling the court that Griner is "the poor of our team," according to NPR's Charles Maynes.

July 15, 2022: Brittney Griner's Lawyers Community Her Medical Records

Griner's lawyers told the date that she has a doctor's note recommending she use cannabis as a pain treatment.

"The attending physician gave Brittney recommendations for the use of medical cannabis. The permission was issued on behalf of the Arizona Responsibility of Health," Griner's lawyer Blagovolina said during Griner's fourth hearing, the Associated Press reported.

The basketball star's safety team also submitted the results of anti-doping tests inaccurate by Griner, which showed no signs of illegal substances in her rules, the outlet added.

The next week, on July 26, the date heard from a narcology expert, The New York Times reported, per Griner's lawyers, in an effort to explain that medical cannabis "is a popular employment, specifically among athletes."

However, Griner's lawyer clogged to say she "involuntarily" brought the cannabis in her suitcase.

"We are not arguing that Brittney took it here as a medicine," her attorney Alexander Boykov said, adding, "The Russian public has to know, and the Russian date in the first place has to know, that it was not used for recreational purposes in the Married States. It was prescribed by a doctor."

As Griner sat in a cage within the courtroom, she spoke to ABC News and wished wife Cherelle, who graduated from law school in May, good luck on the bar exam.

Griner told ABC News that she is "waiting patiently" once in custody but has "no complaints." During the hearing, she held up a sign that included a photograph of her and Cherelle.

July 27, 2022: Brittney Griner Speaks in Court

In novel hearing, the WNBA star told the court that Russian officials did not read any abilities to her when she was arrested at the Moscow airport for possession of cannabis oil in February, according to The Washington Post.

While Griner said a translator at the airport told her where to go, nobody labelled to her what was happening, and she described the general translation services offered to her during her months-long detainment in Russia as "inadequate."

"I remember one time there was a stack of papers that [the translator] obligatory to translate for me. He took a brief look and then said the valid words were, 'Basically you are guilty,' " Griner testified.

During her testimony, the WNBA star told the court via a translator that she was aware she was not decided to bring cannabis oil into the country and said she serene does not "understand how they ended up in her bag."

"I had no map to break the law," she said, adding that she was stressed and rushed once packing and was recovering from a then-recent COVID-19 diagnosis that needed her to take a test before getting on a plane.

Griner also testified that upon her animated, she did not receive access to a lawyer and was made to sign documents deprived of being told what they meant, according to the Associated Press. Griner said that during a Feb. 19 hearing regarding her animated, she received only a "cursory translation" of the allegations made in contradiction of her, according to the AP.

July 27, 2022: The Biden Administration Offers a 'Substantial' Deal to Russia in Skill for Brittney Griner

Later on July 27, news aged that the Biden administration offered a "substantial" deal to Russia to gain the release of Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan, novel American prisoner, per Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

Citing sources, CNN also reported that the White House offered to exchange Griner and Whelan for a Russian prisoner in the Joint States, Viktor Bout, who was convicted for arms trafficking and is now serving 25 years.

Sources told CNN that this plan to swap prisoners was backed by President Joe Biden when being under discussion earlier in the year. With Biden's assist, the plan overrides the Department of Justice, which holds a firm stance in contradiction of prisoner trades.

Blinken said that the White House had been in negotiations with Russia on the potential exchange for weeks, and that he intended to discuss the matter further on a call with the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in the coming days.

Aug. 4, 2022: Brittney Griner Is Sentenced to 9 Years in Prison

As her terresproperty ended, Griner was sentenced to 9 years in a Russian prison, on charges of smuggling drugs into the country.

Griner's lawyers said the verdict, just below the maximum sentence of 10 years, "absolutely unreasonable" and said they will "certainly file an appeal," The New York Times reported.

A Russian deem read Griner, 31, her verdict Thursday about an hour when her lawyers and the prosecution presented their closing arguments. The Phoenix Mercury star had given an emotional speech, reiterating her stance that though she pled guilty to bringing less than 1 gram of cannabis oil into Russia, she did so "inadvertently" and asked the court for leniency.

"That's why I pled guilty to my charges. I understand everything that's been said against me, the charges that are in contradiction of me and that is why I pled guilty but I had no intents to break any Russian laws," Griner said, according to CNN.

In a statement public with PEOPLE, President Joe Biden said the ruling was "unacceptable."