UPDATED with suit dropped: Deadline confirmed on Thursday that Jonathan Majors‘ ex-girlfriend Grace Jabbari has dropped the federal lawsuit in which she accused him of assault and defamation.
The suit, originally filed in March in New York federal court, came less than a month before Majors was sentenced to probation after being convicted of two misdemeanor counts of reckless assault and harassment.
The sentence came at the tail end of a yearlong downward spiral for Majors that began with the actor’s arrest by New York City police on March 25, 2023 for domestic violence. The arrest came just hours after an argument between the actor and Jabbari turned physical inside their chauffeured car late at night in downtown Manhattan.
PREVIOUSLY, March 19, 2024: Less than a month before Jonathan Majors was sentenced to probation in his domestic violence trial in April, the much-accused former Marvel actor has been sued for defamation by his ex-girlfriend.
In a filing in federal court in New York, Grace Jabbari has also provided vivid details of previously alleged incidents of “both verbal and physical abuse” from Majors.
READ THE DEFAMATION COMPLAINT AGAINST JONATHAN MAJORS HERE
The multi-damages-seeking civil complaint listed a series of apparently rage-filled incidents involving Majors almost from the start of the couple’s relationship in 2021 during the UK filming of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. In a litany of assaults, “derogatory names,” broken headphones and self-recrimination, the events just hinted at in Majors’ trial last year become graphic:
In July 2022, while Grace and Majors were in Los Angeles, California, Majors became angry with Grace. She became afraid and instinctively tried to calm him down. Majors began shouting in Grace’s face and grabbed both her arms, pinning them to her body. He then shoved her into the shower door, causing the shower door to open. He then threw her body into the shower wall, causing her head to hit the wall.
When Grace tried to escape, things escalated. In an effort to stop the abuse, Grace informed Majors that she was going to have to inform his team of what he had done to her, at which point, Majors began throwing candles and other objects in a frenzied state, denting the wall and leaving glass shattered on the floor. Majors admitted in his ABC interview that he “completely lost my temper in that moment and threw it all on the ground. That’s not something I would want my child to do, and I did that. I absolutely did that.”
Arrested on March 25, 2023 after the alleged assault on Jabbari in New York City, Majors was convicted in December of reckless assault and harassment . Up against a total of four misdemeanor charges, Majors, who pleaded not guilty, was not convicted by the jury of three men and three women of intentional assault in the third degree and of aggravated harassment in the second degree against then-girlfriend Jabbari in the incident in last spring.
Long before the much delayed trial finally started, during trial through his lawyers and since, Majors had vehemently denied he attacked the British dancer after she discovered texts from another woman on his phone while the two were being driven through the Big Apple late that weekend night last year. In fact, attorney Priya Chaudhry claimed Majors was the actual victim of abuse by Jabbari and racism by the NYPD. The Magazine Dreams star actually took Jabbari to court and had the police issue a de facto warrant for the British national’s arrest — and that was some of the more polite responses.
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“When publicly confronted with Grace’s numerous allegations of abuse, Majors has called her a liar at every turn and very specifically claimed that he has never put his hands on a woman, with the goal of convincing the world that Grace is not a victim of domestic abuse but instead a crazy liar who should be treated as such,” today’s filing for defamation, malicious prosecution and more states.
Of course, even though Majors told ABC News in a sit-down in January this year that “my hands have never struck a woman,” texts and recordings dramatically unsealed in last year’s trial (due in no small part to overreach by the defense) strongly indicate otherwise — as do subsequent allegations from other women and today’s filing. Yet, up until today, besides Majors begging Jabbari not to go to a hospital after one such attack, we knew very little about the specifics of those previous incidents.
“It takes true bravery to hold someone with this level of power and acclaim accountable,” Jabbari’s lawyer Brittany Henderson said in a statement today. “Bravery that Grace Jabbari has demonstrated at every stage of the legal process. We strongly believe that through this action, truth and transparency will bring Grace the justice that she deserves.”
“This is no surprise,” said Chaudhry after today’s filing went public. “Mr. Majors is preparing counterclaims against Ms. Jabbari,” she added, virtually confirming the point of Jabbari’s filing. The Manhattan District Attorney’s office, who successfully prosecuted Majors’ criminal trial, declined comment on the new legal action.
Although Majors’ management and PR firms dropped him soon after the incident with Jabbari, the once Oscar-pegged Magazine Dreams has been shelved and Marvel axed the actor who was to play Kang the Conqueror in the expanding MCU, along with several film roles and ad campaigns, WME has stayed with the actor over the months leading up to the trial and since.
