Hours after Jonathan Majors was found guilty of assault and harassment in connection with a March incident with his ex-girlfriend, Marvel Studios has reportedly dropped the actor.
Majors, 34, was found guilty on Monday of two counts, including harassment in the second degree and misdemeanor assault in the third degree in connection with the March 25 incident with his then-girlfriend, Grace Jabbari. He was also found not guilty of misdemeanor aggravated harassment in the second degree and a separate misdemeanor assault charge under a different statute.
At the time of his arrest for allegedly attacking Jabbari in the back of a chauffeured car in New York, Majors was on the verge of superstardom at the start of 2023 after landing several big roles, including one in a Marvel movie. The Hollywood Reporter and Variety reported that just hours after the verdict, Marvel Studios decided to part ways with Majors, who played Kang the Conquerer in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
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As the verdict was read, Majors looked slightly downward, the AP reported. In a statement to The Daily Beast, Jabbari’s lawyer said his team is “gratified to see justice” in the guilty verdict.
Majors’ lawyer, Priya Chaudhry, said in another statement to The Daily Beast, “it is clear that the jury did not believe Grace Jabbari’s story of what happened in the SUV because they found that Mr. Majors did not intentionally cause any injuries to her. We are grateful for that.”
“We are disappointed, however, that despite not believing Ms. Jabbari, the jury nevertheless found that Mr. Majors was somehow reckless while she was attacking him,” Chaudhry added. “Mr. Majors is grateful to God, his family, his friends, and his fans for their love and support during these harrowing eight months. Mr. Majors still has faith in the process and looks forward to fully clearing his name.”
“Ms. Jabbari testified publicly and truthfully, even though reliving these traumatic events on the witness stand was obviously painful,” said Ross Kramer, attorney and director of the Incarcerated Gender Violence Survivors Initiative. “Unfortunately, for every survivor like Ms. Jabbari who comes forward to hold their abuser accountable, there are many others who believe that they cannot. We hope that her actions will inspire other survivors to speak their truth and seek justice.”
The jurors deliberated the verdict over a three day period in the highly publicized trial in Manhattan criminal court. Judge Michael Gaffey said Majors will be sentenced on Feb. 6, where he faces up to a year in prison.
Throughout the nine-day trial, prosecutors alleged Majors engaged in a “cruel and manipulative pattern of abuse” against Jabbari throughout their relationship. That alleged abuse included throwing household items at a wall during a fight, yanking her headphones out while she was running to scold her, and even begging her not to seek medical attention for a head injury and threatening suicide after a September 2022 incident.
“Control, domination, manipulation, and abuse,” prosecutor Kelli Galaway said during closing arguments on Thursday. “This is not a revenge plot to ruin the defendant’s life, his career, to take everything away from him.”
In a Monday statement, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg thanked the jury “for its service and the survivor for bravely telling her story despite having to relive her trauma on the stand.”
The actor’s defense attorneys, however, argued throughout the trial that Jabbari was the true aggressor in the March incident that left Majors with a “bloody gash, scratch, and scared.”
“Jonathan Majors is innocent and Grace is a liar,” Chaudhry said Thursday. “His fear of what happens when a Black man in America calls 911 came true. And now we’re here.”
During her four days on the stand, Jabbari testified that the March altercation began as the couple was headed home from a night out in Brooklyn. While driving over the Manhattan Bridge, Jabbari said, she saw a text conversation between Majors and someone named “Cleopatra.”
Majors had texted “Cleopatra” a link to the 1995 D’Angelo song “Lady,” and in response, the mystery individual responded, “Oh, how I wish to be kissing you.”
Stunned, Jabbari said, she immediately grabbed Majors’ phone, prompting the actor to throw himself on top of her, before he grabbed her arm and placed it behind her back. “He was trying to hurt me,” she said on the stand, adding that he also twisted her arm and that she felt a “really hard blow against my head.”
But the driver of the car, Naveed Sarwar, described the interaction a little differently. Speaking through an Urdu interpreter, the driver testified that Majors was “not doing anything” inside the car and that Jabbari was “doing everything.”
Surveillance footage played in court showed that at one point, Majors got out of the car to get away from Jabbari. In the video, Majors is seen shoving Jabbari back in the Escalade before he runs away, prompting Jabbari to run after him.
“He was trying to get rid of her,” Sarwar said, later adding that Majors was “trying to throw her in the car.” “He was saying, ‘Leave me alone, I have to go.’”
After Majors and Jabbari briefly met up again, the pair went their separate ways. Jabbari testified that she went to a birthday party with some strangers who offered to help her find a ride home, while the actor went to a Manhattan hotel. Hours later, she testified, she left the bar to head home and noticed that Majors had sent her a text breaking up with her.
Back at their Chelsea apartment, Jabbari said, she spoke with Majors on the phone and he insisted he did not cheat on her—but that he had deleted the text thread with “Cleopatra.” Jabbari said that she hung up on Majors and went to bed when he did not answer her attempts to speak to him again. She took two over-the-counter sleeping pills to help her get some shut-eye amid the “pain,” she testified. She said she had taken the pills multiple times before.
Hours later, she said, she woke up and started to realize the full extent of her injuries, prompting her to speak with a friend before eventually falling asleep near the bathroom floor from exhaustion.
Majors returned home to the apartment the next morning, where he found Jabbari and called 911. In the 911 call played in court, Majors told a dispatcher he believed Jabbari “attempted suicide.” Jabbari said she was “totally overwhelmed” when she woke up to find several officers at her apartment and admitted she was initially cagey about what happened the previous night out of fear for Majors’ safety.
“I think just things he had told me in the past about not trusting the police and what they would do to him as a Black man, and I didn’t want to put him in that situation,” Jabbari said. “I wanted to say, ‘Help me, please.’”
Even at the hospital, she said she had trouble describing the full extent of the dispute to doctors examining her injuries, which included a fracture to her middle finger and a cut to her ear. She also underwent a psych exam and was cleared. Jabbari said she learned of Majors’ arrest while she was at the hospital.
The arrest sent Majors’ career into a free fall, spurring his management and PR firm to drop him. Rolling Stone also published a report about his alleged abusive behavior toward at least two former romantic partners, crew members, and his Yale School of Drama classmates.
Majors, however, has firmly maintained his innocence and his legal team has gone to great lengths to combat the bad press. In June, Majors also filed a counterclaim against Jabbari, in which he insisted that he was the victim of the late-night incident. He also alleged that Jabbari stole his vintage Rolex and that she later injured herself alone in his apartment. Jabbari received a desk ticket for the claim, but the District Attorney’s Office declined to prosecute.
