Jonathan Majors picked up then-girlfriend ‘as if she was a doll,’ NYC prosecutor says as assault case goes to jury
Jonathan Majors picked up his then-girlfriend “as if she was a doll” and shoved her into the back seat of an SUV when she discovered he’d cheated on her, a prosecutor described at the actor’s Manhattan trial Thursday — before jurors began weighing his fate.
In her closing statement, Assistant District Attorney Kelli Galaway argued that video showing Majors getting “onto his tiptoes to get as much leverage as possible” before he pushed Jabbari back inside their car service was indisputable evidence to convict him on a misdemeanor harassment charge.
The 34-year-old actor — who played the supervillain Kang the Conqueror in Marvel’s “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” — teared up as his own defense lawyer accused his ex, Grace Jabbari, of telling “white lies, big lies, and pretty little lies” as part of a prosecution the attorney claimed was racially motivated.
“His fear of what happens when a Black man in America calls 911 came true,” Priya Chaudhry said in Manhattan Criminal Court as Majors, wearing a black suit and black tie, dabbed tears away from his cheeks with a tissue.
Majors was arrested in March when police discovered injuries on Jabbari, 30, after the actor called them to his Chelsea apartment the morning following the struggle inside the private car that erupted when prosecutors said Jabbari snatched his phone away to look at a flirty text from a woman named “Cleopatra.”
During four grueling days of testimony — which included several instances of a sobbing Jabbari leaving the stand for a break — the British dancer and movement coach told jurors that Majors delivered a “hard blow across my head,” peeled her fingers from his phone and twisted her arm behind her back in the struggle.
Surveillance video from the scene showed Majors lifting up Jabbari and pushing her several times back inside the black Cadillac Escalade after it pulled over in Chinatown.
The video shows Jabbari eventually following Majors out of the SUV and to the corner of Centre and Canal Streets, where he extends his arms to push her away from him before sprinting off — with her chasing him for several city blocks.
The other two charges Majors is facing, for intentionally and recklessly assaulting Jabbari, are tied to the part of the altercation that unfolded inside the back seat of the Cadillac Escalade, rather than outside of it.
The six jurors began deliberating at around 3:30 p.m., and Majors’ fate will likely be decided by whether the panel believes Jabbari’s account of what happened that night.
The sole witness to the alleged assault, the car’s driver, told jurors that he didn’t see what happened because he was looking “straight ahead” at the road.
The driver claimed to have had a “feeling” that Jabbari was the aggressor, but he also said that he was paid by Majors, and acknowledged knowing the actor previously.
The driver’s testimony “reveals him to be a biased witness to the man who paid him,” Galaway, the prosecutor, said Thursday.
The ADA also brought up evidence of Majors’ past behavior that was unearthed during the two-week-trial — including that he begged Jabbari not to go to the hospital after she was injured in a separate September 2022 incident — in a bid to paint the alleged assault as the culmination of a months-long campaign of “manipulation and abuse.”
Majors threatened to kill himself after Jabbari responded to the “Loki” star she would “tell the doctor I bumped my head,” trial evidence revealed.
The suicide threat “was not a mental health crisis,” Galaway said Thursday.
“This was a strategically planned tactic to ensure Ms. Jabbari’s compliance,” she added.
Chaudhry, meanwhile, accused Jabbari of “revenge partying” after the alleged March assault by going to a club with a group of bystanders who offered to help her.
The defense attorney drew jurors’ attention to footage of Jabbari toasting champagne glasses, brushing her hair back and signing a check with her right hand, despite her testimony that Majors had fractured her right middle finger when he peeled it from her phone.
“You don’t get to destroy people’s lives with your fantasies,” Chaudhry said of Jabbari.
Chaudhry also stressed that Jabbari was the one seen on camera chasing Majors after the alleged assault — which Jabbari testified happened because she was in a rage about Majors’ alleged cheating and wanted answers.
“She didn’t pretend she was okay with being cheated on,” Galaway said Thursday. “All she was focused on was her devastation about the infidelity.”
“I submit to you that Ms. Jabbari testified candidly,” the prosecutor added. “When she didn’t know an answer, she said she didn’t know.”
“She provided you with as much detail as she could about what happened in a short encounter.”
Majors could face up to a year behind bars, if convicted.
