D.C. police are searching for the suspect who was caught on camera defacing a mural of Black singer and activist Paul Robeson along the U Street corridor.
For Abdur-Rahim Muhammad, the mural depicting Robeson's life has been a dream come true.
"We now have tours of all the murals up and down U Street. At any day in the summer you can come down here and maybe find 30, 35 people out here with a tour guide just learning more about Paul Robeson," Muhhamad said.
Muhammad has operated the Hung Tao Choy Mei Leadership Institute on U Street for almost 30 years. The nonprofit offers martial arts and other cultural classes to children and adults free of charge.
Robeson's image has graced the outside wall of the cultural center since 2015.
On Sunday, someone was seen spray painting graffiti over Robeson's image.
"My first feeling was of anger, you know. Then it turned to a little mixture of anger and disappointment," Muhammad said.
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Jason Taylor shot video of the suspect as he casually spray painted the mural.
"We immediately said, you know, 'Dude, what are you doing? Stop that. Why are you defacing Black history in D.C.?' Those mean a lot to the culture of D.C., not only D.C., but to Black culture, American culture, and for someone to be so bold as to deface that is just wrong on so many levels," Taylor, a photographer, said.
It's not the first time, however, that someone has defaced the mural. Graffiti was spray painted on another part of it three weeks earlier.
Cory Stowers, one of the artists responsible for creating the mural, said he doesn't believe the person who vandalized it was racially motivated.
"I think it was targeted because this is one of the biggest walls on U Street and it's very visible from the traffic lane right here and so that would make this wall a target and not necessarily Mr. Robeson," Stowers said.
"It's a little disheartening, but it's to be expected. It's kind of par for the course with art on the street," he said.
Muhammed and Stowers are raising money online and have spoken to the D.C. Commission on Arts to try to get money to repaint the mural.
"We think something bigger and better will come of it," Muhammed said. "Once you understand things, that anger kind of turns into, 'OK … what can we do now? How do we start planning and make this thing better.'"
