Bring Our Family is partnered with Brittney Griner of Phoenix Mercury.
Brittney Griner and Phoenix Mercury Support Safe Return of Wrongful Detainees Overseases Through Partnership in the Bring Our Families Home Campaign Advocate for the Safe Return of Wrongful Detainees Abroad at Home.
PHOENIX: In Brittney Griner’s press conference today, her first since her safe homecoming, Griner and the Phoenix Mercury will announce a partnership with Bring Our Families Home (BOFH), a campaign formed in 2022 by the family members of American hostages and unlawful prisoners detained overseas. The campaign calls on the White House to act swiftly and forcefully to return detainees home and offer support to their families.
The Mercury is supporting Griner by donating funds and its platform to Bring Our Families Home in an effort to bring attention to the predicament of wrongfully detained individuals.
Together, they will use a campaign that kicks off today with the painting of a mural on the west side of Footprint Centre, the team’s home arena in downtown Phoenix, to share the tales of Americans who have been wrongly imprisoned overseas. Griner’s face is painted in the mural with the faces of over a dozen prisoners, some of whom have been in custody for almost ten years. Griner will unveil the mural with Neda Sharghi, chair of BOFH’s steering committee, who directs the campaign’s strategy and closely collaborates with the relatives of inmates. Sharghi is the sister of Emad Shargi, who is incorrectly detained at Iran’s infamous Evin Prison.
A QR code on the 30-foot-wide mural points to www.BringOurFamiliesHome.org. In addition, later this season, supporters will be able to visit a special hub on PhoenixMercury.com to gain additional information about each person and ways to support the cause.
Throughout the 2023 season, news and updates on the coalition’s initiatives will be added to the hub. In order to maintain awareness of the names and narratives of those jailed, The Mercury will include social media content and in-game PSAs. When the Mercury start their 2023 season in May, the BOFH logo will be attached to the team’s home court, taking the place of the “BG42” symbol that was put in place next to centre court the previous year.
The Mercury will have a letter-writing station at each regular season home game this summer where fans may write handwritten messages of support and encouragement to those who are detained as well as requests that government authorities take action to bring people home. When the Mercury travel to other markets, friends and family of wrongful detainees will be welcomed to Mercury games in Phoenix and other cities across the nation.
Vince Kozar, President of the Mercury: “Brittney Griner’s unjustified imprisonment brought awareness to the predicament of hostages worldwide and their families in the Valley, as well as to our organisation and our fan base. Beyond personal safety, we discovered that the greatest worry is being forgotten. We also discovered that the people in custody now do not often have the same public profile or media coverage as Brittney’s case did.
Even if we are powerless to change that on our own, we want to contribute to the issue by using our platform to raise awareness of these people for the duration of the 2023 WNBA season and beyond. Neda and Bring Our Families Home have our sincere gratitude for agreeing to collaborate with us.