Mural highlights face of Whelan, other Americans held abroad in effort to bring them home

Kristen Jordan Shamus, Detroit Free Press
·3 min read

The black-and-white faces of 18 Americans held hostage or wrongfully detained abroad stretch across a brick wall on M Street in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C.

The mural, unveiled Tuesday, was commissioned by the Bring Our Families Home Campaign, and includes the face of Paul Whelan, the Michigan businessman who has been held in Russia since 2018 on false charges of espionage.

Whelan lived in Novi and was the head of global security for Auburn Hills-based auto supplier BorgWarner when he was arrested in Moscow in December 2018. He was charged with espionage after Russian authorities said they caught him with a USB drive containing classified information.

He and his family insist he was set up and has been wrongly detained since. Whelan was convicted in a closed-door court hearing and sentenced to 16 years in a labor camp. He now is being held at IK-17 in the Republic of Mordovia.

The mural, created by artist Isaac Campbell using photographs and wheat paste, shows “the intense juxtaposition of time" for U.S. hostages and detainees.

"All of these images have come from family members," he said. "These are treasured artifacts. Many of these photographs are the last photographs that these families have had of their loved one before they were taken."

Family members of Matthew Heath, a United States Marine Corps veteran who has been detained in Venezuela since September 9, 2020, move away from the crowd and huddle to listen and talk on an unexpected phone call from Matthew Heath just as a mural honoring 18 wrongfully detained Americans by artist Isaac Campbell is unveiled in Washington DC on Wednesday, July 20, 2022. One of those honored on the mural is Paul Whelan, who has been detained in Russia since 2018. Whelan is a former US Marine and convicted by Russian officials on espionage charges in 2020.

For those who were detained or taken hostage a decade ago, the digital images aren't as crisp.

"You can see time in the resolution of the pictures," Campbell said. "As the artist, when I was receiving these pictures, it was the most intense feeling to look at those images and put them next to one another and see the story of these lives and these families over time."

More: Paul Whelan's sister gets call from President Joe Biden

At Tuesday’s unveiling, spokesperson Jonathan Franks asked for a 60-second moment of silence to remember Whelan and the 17 others pictured on the wall.

“The path to this moment today has been a long and emotional one for our families," Franks said. "Hostage diplomacy is the practice of state-sponsored kidnapping for ransom. Every person whose name I just read was targeted or singled out for no other reason than their American citizenship. In at least two cases featured on today’s mural, the detainees were targeted in part because they are veterans. The solution is to cause pain for the hostage takers and those whom they love.

"I am not suggesting violating anyone’s human rights. I am suggesting that if you’re benefiting from proximity to a rogue regime that takes Americans hostage, that you don’t get to hide your wife and kids in the West anymore.

"No more fancy American or European boarding schools for your kids. No more shopping trips to Paris for family members. Ultimately, our campaign seeks to urge President (Joe)  Biden to ... make use of all the tools in the toolbox to bring others home, including but not limited to prisoner trades. Doing so is not only the right thing to do, it’s the right political decision."

Contact Kristen Shamus: kshamus@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @kristenshamus. 

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Paul Whelan among 18 featured in DC mural of Americans held abroad