If you’re of a certain age, you remember the 1978 movie “Midnight Express,” which was the terrifying (though highly dramatized) account of the arrest and incarceration of American Billy Hayes for a drug offense in Turkey. The harrowing portrayal of Hayes’ ordeal introduced the term “Turkish prison” into the American vernacular as a synonym for “hellhole run by sadistic degenerates” and scared a whole generation straight, at least when it came to overseas hashish trafficking. It probably didn’t do much to help the Turkish tourism industry, either.
Being left to rot in a nightmarish prison in an America-hating country for a minor offense is more than a ’70s movie trope; it’s a current reality for American WNBA star Brittney Griner, who has languished in Russian custody since February for possession of a small amount of cannabis oil. Griner has pleaded guilty to drug charges and faces up to 10 years in a Moscow prison.
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