Wrongful detention

[4][5] A wrongfully detained person is someone held by a government or state actor, often on questionable legal grounds, without the clear intention of using them as leverage to force another party to act.

[7][9][2] Wrongful detention is a broader legal term encompassing any unlawful restraint of a person's movement where the detainer is a government entity acting without proper authority.

[2] Article 9 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights decrees that "no one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile",[10] that is, no individual, regardless of circumstances, is to be deprived of their liberty without having first committed an actual criminal offense against a legal statute, and a government cannot deprive an individual of their liberty without proper due process of law.

In response to the disappearance of Robert Levinson, in 2014 president Barack Obama ordered a review of the US policy on hostage taking.

[21] The Act establishes a framework for determining what constitutes being “unlawfully or wrongfully detained”, codifies the establishment of the SPEHA, HRFC and the HRG, and creates the possibility of targeted sanctions for persons or foreign governments which have been found to wrongfully detain U.S. citizens or participate in hostage-taking.