Roc Nation is a full-service entertainment and management agency, and they are deeply dedicated to advancing criminal justice reform in the United States. One of their artists, Meek Mill, has become a leader of this movement, speaking out on the injustice he experienced first hand following an arrest at the age of 18. Together, they started the #Reform campaign to expose injustice, and to affect real, lasting change.

We needed to create a film that would launch this massive initiative, and educate the public on the failures of our Criminal Justice System in the process.

Specifically, we wanted to clearly illustrate how a system with a set of rights created to protect you, has completely failed to protect minorities, and instead has trapped them in a cycle of injustice.

We created a film narrated by Meek Mill which uses the most famous and iconic words of the criminal justice system to clearly expose it’s failures. The script demonstrates how the justice system - from arrest through release - fails to protect the poor and people of color, and instead, seems to actively work against them to keep them trapped in a cycle that sees them return to prison again and again. The piece concludes with a CTA to stand up for equal rights, and to join the push for #Reform.

In order to raise mass awareness, we needed a recognizable face of the movement, but one that would not loom larger than the many millions who’ve fallen victim to a cycle of injustice. As a celebrity who experienced injustice first hand, Meek helped us strike the perfect balance needed to raise awareness for the reform movement without it becoming too tied to his own personal narrative. By placing Meek in the film, we were able to galvanize his large base of supporters to continue raising the voices for reform, and give them a substantive piece to rally around. But we placed the film in the New York Times to carry his story to those who might otherwise not come across it, and those who simply needed to hear the facts, regardless of who delivered them.

In our film, A New Set of Rights, Hip Hop artist turned activist Meek Mill exposes how the U.S. Criminal Justice System is designed to disproportionately make it easier for the poor, and people of color to end up in prison, and more difficult to free themselves from it’s grasp. The script takes us on a journey through this cycle - from arrest to release to reimprisonment- to expose how rights associated with each part of the process fail to protect minorities as promised, and instead, seem to work against them. Each right is followed by a corresponding statistic to highlight racial bias. “You have the right to be innocent until proven guilty,” he recites, “but somehow about 47% of the wrongfully convicted are black.” The stats were verified by New York Times fact checkers, and the piece ran as an op-ed to reach as many people as possible.

The film was shared by politicians and organizations, celebrities, and activists, ultimately earning upwards of 660 Million impressions with 0 paid media dollars driving the engagement. On the day of the launch, the piece trended on Twitter with 26k engagements. But people didn’t just watch the video -- they interacted with it. Substantive conversations dominated comment sections on every platform, teachers included the video in lesson plans, and interviewers probed and unpacked the script during Meek Mill’s album press tour. The film successfully sparked a national conversation around Justice Reform, giving the movement critical momentum ahead of the First Step Act, which was passed just six weeks after our films release.