It took two weeks, but the New York banker who went viral for punching a woman in the face after a Brooklyn Pride event has resigned, his company announced this week.
Jonathan Kaye, who served as a managing director at publicly traded investment bank Moelis & Company, was videotaped hitting the woman earlier this month. The company confirmed that he was the suspect in question soon after.
“We have become aware that one of our employees was involved in a serious incident in Brooklyn on June 8,” it acknowledged in a statement. “We take this matter very seriously and are conducting an investigation.”
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According to the New York Post, prior to the incident Kaye had gotten into an argument with the woman about Israel and Palestine. The banker, who is reportedly Jewish, claimed in the video that the woman “threw shit all over me.” It wasn’t immediately clear how the exchange escalated so dramatically.
The Post reported that the woman, who is in her late thirties, was allegedly left with “a broken nose, lacerations and a black eye.” A police inquiry remains underway.
In a statement earlier this month, the Brooklyn Pride Board said the assault appeared “to have occurred way after the parade had ended,” adding that it “condemns violence of any kind, and... will continue to monitor what we believe was an abhorrent incident.”
After this article initially published, a spokesperson for Kaye reached out to offer his version of events.
He lashed out, the statement claimed, because he feared “for his physical safety when he was surrounded by an angry mob of agitators who encircled him, physically assaulted him, and threw unknown liquids on him. He could not identify any of these individuals and was left bloodied from the attack.”
“Given the sharp rise in antisemitic incidents, any Jewish person in this situation would naturally feel threatened and feel the need to defend themselves and return safely to their family,” the statement continued. “Mr. Kaye will fully cooperate with authorities to resolve this matter and clear his name.”
According to his biography on the Moelis website, which has since been taken down, Kaye worked in investment banking for two decades and has carved out a niche in “industrial, white collar and technology-enabled services.”
He graduated from Tufts University and the Duke University School of Law, and also studied at the Fletcher School, Tufts’ graduate institution specializing in law and diplomacy.
