Russia continued to make its case against Brittney Griner at her trial on Thursday, more than 140 days since the WNBA star was arrested at a Moscow-area airport on drug charges.

It marks Griner's second court appearance since her trial began in earnest last Friday. A judge had previously ordered her to be detained for the length of the trial, which her lawyer has said could last up to two months and will likely involve several hearings by the prosecution before the defense gets its turn.

The Biden administration is facing intense scrutiny over its handling of WNBA star Brittney Griner's detention in Russia, with some questioning the White House's commitment to helping based on Griner's race and gender.

Detained in Russia since Feb. 17 on marijuana-related charges, Griner has penned a letter to President Joe Biden while her friends and family plead with the administration to help. The State Department deemed her wrongfully detained in May, and Biden met with her wife, Cherelle, on Wednesday.

Russia said on Thursday that it was difficult to exchange prisoners with the United States and suggested Washington be silent about the fate of Brittney Griner, the U.S. basketball star detained in Russia on drugs charges.

Referring to a letter that U.S. President Joe Biden intends to send to Griner according to NBC news, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said that "hype" around the case does not help, and that "this kind of correspondence does not help".

In the 2005 Nicolas Cage movie “Lord of War,” the character loosely based on Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout evades his American law enforcement pursuers, apparently saved by the CIA.

But in real life, the U.S. government set up an elaborate operation in 2008 to capture and prosecute Bout, dubbed “the Merchant of Death,” because he was said to be one of the world’s largest illicit arms dealers.

President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris spoke by phone Wednesday with Cherelle Griner, the wife of WNBA star Brittney Griner, who is detained in a Russian prison, according to the White House.

Biden has also written a letter in response to Brittney Griner's handwritten letter, which he shared with her wife during the call.

A handwritten letter from Brittney Griner was delivered to the White House on Monday morning, according to the Griner family, who provided excerpts to reporters. In her letter, the imprisoned WNBA star pleaded with the president not to forget her, and said her already deep appreciation for Independence Day has taken on new meaning this year. 

U.S. basketball star Brittney Griner went on trial in a court on the outskirts of Moscow on Friday to hear drug charges that could see her serve up to 10 years in a Russian jail.

Griner, 31, was formally told at this first hearing that she was charged with intentionally importing narcotics into Russia. She spoke to say she understood the charges. The judge set the next hearing for July 7.

A Russian court announced that the trial of WNBA superstar Brittney Griner, who has been wrongfully detained since mid-February, will commence at the beginning of July.

Griner had a preliminary court hearing in the Moscow suburb of Khimki on Monday, when the trial date was handed down. The basketball star was arrested on Feb. 17 for alleged drug possession and could face 10 years in prison if convicted. Fewer than 1% of all defendants in Russian criminal cases are acquitted, according to the Associated Press.

WNBA star Brittney Griner, who was arrested at a Moscow airport in February for allegedly carrying cannabis vape cartridges, made her first court appearance Friday and got her pretrial detention extended by a month.

Griner, 31, a 6-foot-9 center for the Phoenix Mercury, appeared in handcuffs, her head low and covered by an orange hoodie.

For another person in another country at another time, the case might have been a minor matter: an American citizen detained at an airport for allegedly possessing a cannabis derivative legal in much of the world.

But the circumstances for Brittney Griner couldn’t have been worse.