Actor Jonathan Majors appeared in court today via Zoom in relation to his March 25 arrest for an alleged domestic violence dispute. He is being charged with third degree assault, which is being identified as a class A misdemeanor. The sentence could result in up to 12 months in jail or three years of probation, according to Deadline. The hearing was held in Manhattan and Majors appeared virtually but did not say much more than “Yes, ma’am,” when responding to Judge Rachel S. Pauley.
For the next hearing, which is set for June 13, Majors will be required to appear in person. The judge explained, “I’m required to inform you that, as you know, if you fail to appear in court on June 13, a warrant can be issued for your arrest within 48 hours and if you’re brought back on the warrant, the next judge can revoke and even set bail. I obviously don’t want that to happen.” The Judge went on to say that Majors must continue to abide by the restraining order, which bars him from coming into contact with the alleged victim.
After the hearing, outside of court, Majors’s lawyer Priya Chaudhry made a statement publicly. She furiously criticized the D.A.’s approach to the case. “We have provided the District Attorney with irrefutable evidence that the woman is lying, including video proof showing nothing happened, especially not where she claimed. We did this with the explicit promise from the DA that they would not ‘fix’ their case and change it as we proved the woman is lying. This is a witch hunt against Jonathan Majors, driven by baseless claims.
Deadline secured additional remarks from Chaudhry, where she called the process a “glaring double standard,” going even further to say, “Instead of dismissing the allegations in the face of the woman’s clear lies, the DA has adjusted the charges to match the woman’s new lies. To be clear, there are no new charges against Mr. Majors.”
Next, Chaudhry confronted the criminal justice system saying it “is saturated with explicit and implicit bias.” She described the scene of the arrest, and explained that, “When Mr. Majors showed a white police officer the injuries the woman caused him, the white officer got in Mr. Majors’ face and taunted him, saying that if the officer were to slap Mr. Majors, the officer wouldn’t break his finger.” In addition, Chaudhry went on to say, “None of the white officers present investigated the assault of Mr. Majors. Worse, the District Attorney has not indicated any intention to pursue charges against the woman, or even investigate the truth.”
