Acclaimed US filmmaker Ava DuVernay (Selma, 13th, When They See Us) has revealed a new arts-driven campaign aimed at holding police officers to account. The Law Enforcement Accountability Project (LEAP) will fund 25 projects ranging from theatre to photography, music and dance, with the combined aim of serving retrospective action for police officers who have acted with impunity.

Supported by fellow filmmaker Jordan Peele, the initiative (which is partly funded by the Ford Foundation and US screenwriter Ryan Murphy) aims to dismantle the current system under which police officers who commit unlawful acts of violence are often afforded anonymity and in some cases, paid suspension. Under DuVernay’s new initiative, which began earlier this year in response to the distressing footage of 21 year-old Tye Anders being pinned to the ground by Texas police officers, the identities of perpetrators will be brought to public attention.

Speaking over Twitter, DuVernay said, “Officers who kill unarmed Black people often get admin pay, another job, a life of anonymity. Their victims get eulogies. We have a blind spot as a society in agreeing not to speak these officer’s names. I do not agree to that anymore.”

Officers who kill unarmed Black people often get admin pay, another job, a life of anonymity. Their victims get eulogies.

We have a blind spot as a society in agreeing not to speak these officer’s names. I do not agree to that anymore.

Join @leapaction. https://t.co/jVh65zu6Tc

— Ava DuVernay (@ava) June 8, 2020

Anders is just one of countless black names to have suffered racially motivated violence at the hands of police whose crimes have since gone unpunished. In March this year, a 26-year-old emergency medical technician Breonna Taylor was killed in her home after police raided the wrong apartment. In 2016, a 40 year-old unarmed black man named Terence Crutcher was shot to death by a white office in Tulsa. In both cases, as in so many others, the police officers were acquitted. Even in cases where action is taken, it comes years late, follows a tortuous process of court appeals and barely constitutes justice. Look, for example, at the case of Daniel Pantaleo, the NYC police officer who remained in his job 5 years after murdering Eric Garner in 2014, and even then his sentence amounted to merely losing his job (a decision Pantaleo is now appealing).

DuVernay is yet to reveal any details about the upcoming projects but has said they will debut in August.

Change begins with the stories we tell each other about the police and Black people. This must be our work.

Join us in disrupting the code of silence that exists around police aggression and abuse. Your social platform is your weapon.

Sign up at https://t.co/sVWPlOA8Mt. pic.twitter.com/MncqvYuaTV

— LEAP (@LeapAction) June 8, 2020