Jonathan Majors Domestic Violence Accuser Threatened Suicide, NY DA Tells Trial; Defense Claims Prosecution Want To “Distract” Jury
04.12.2023 - 18:47
/ deadline.com
Jonathan Majors used cruelty and manipulation to control Grace Jabbari — and when his girlfriend of two years discovered that the acclaimed actor was cheating on her with another woman, the psychological abuse turned physical. That what the a prosecution told a New York City jury today in opening arguments of Majors’ domestic violence trial
Jabbari also threatened to commit suicide that night, an assistant Manhattan district attorney, Michael Perez, told jurors as Jabbari and Majors both sat in the courtroom looking on.
Unsurprisingly, in opening statements from both the prosecution and the defense this morning it was a tale of two very different incidents.
The Creed III actor left Jabbari with a fractured finger, pain from a twisted arm, and a bloody cut behind one ear while wresting his cellphone back from her on a late-night car ride through Manhattan in the late hours between March 24 and 25, Perez said.
Selected on November 30 out of a pool of 39, a jury of three men and three women plus two alternates will weigh the assault and harassment against Majors in a trial expected to last two weeks. Jabbari, who turned herself in to police in October based on the cross-complaint from Majors, is on a prosecution witness list of more than a dozen people, and is expected to testify.
At present, it is unclear whether Majors will take the stand in his own defense. Having entered a not guilty plea earlier this year, the actor is facing up to a year behind bars if convicted.
In describing the night in question, ADA Perez also told the court that Jabbari had spotted a text on Majors’ cellphone from another woman and grabbed the device. After the driver stopped and the confrontation spilled on to a street in Chinatown, Majors