Over 155,000 people have signed a petition calling for Amber Heard to be removed from Aquaman 2 after a series of leaked audiotapes revealed she admitted to “hitting” ex-husband Johnny Depp.

Petition creator, Jeanne Larson, called upon outraged fans to take a stand against domestic violence.

“As Amber Heard is a known and proven domestic abuser, Warner Brothers and DC Entertainment should and must remove Heard from their Aquaman 2 film project,” she wrote on change.org.

“They must not ignore the suffering of Heard’s victims and must not glamorize a domestic abuser. Men are victims of domestic abuse, just like women. This must be recognized, and action must be taken to prevent a known abuser from being celebrated within the entertainment industry.”

Heard’s past accounts of domestic violence and her current attempts to tarnish Johnny Depp’s reputation are also outlined in the petition, as reported by news.com.au.

The Aquaman star is now involved in a complex legal battle with Depp after he launched a $50 million defamation case after the starlet implied in a Washington Post opinion piece last year that he had abused her during their “toxic” 18-month marriage. The Pirates of the Caribbean star claims his ex-wife repeatedly assaulted him, one occasion resulting in the top of his finger being severed when she threw a bottle of vodka at him.

Larson’s petition was created after The Daily Mail published a series of audiotapes recorded on Heard’s phone in 2015 as the couple attempted to work through their marriage problems. The tapes reveal Heard admitting to “hitting” Depp in a fight, mocking him as a “baby” and warning that “I can’t promise you I won’t get physical like that again”.

A spokeswoman for Heard accused Depp of “vindictively” leaking the tape, telling The Daily Mail, “Anyone familiar with the dynamics of domestic abuse would immediately recognize what is really going on here.”

It has been reported that Depp has made previous attempts to have Heard removed from her role as Mera, as he claims her Washington Post article directly resulted in him being dumped from the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.

While the sequel to 2018’s Aquaman is set to begin filming this year ahead of its 2022 release, Heard is yet to be confirmed as returning to her role as Mera. (mad/kes)