'Creed III'

Source: MGM / Warner Bros

‘Creed III’

Jury deliberations have begun in the Manhattan assault and harassment trial of actor Jonathan Majors after both sides rested their cases on Thursday.

The prosecution has asserted Majors, who starred as Kang The Conqueror in this year’s Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania, assaulted his then girlfriend Grace Jabbari in the back of a car in New York in March of this year.

The prosecution claimed that the couple had an altercation after Jabbari saw texts with another woman on Majors’ phone and Majors hit her and dragged her back into the car when she attempted to get out.

Later that night Jabbari called the police and was found with cuts and bruises at the home they shared. She was taken to hospital and Majors was arrested and subsequently charged with two counts of assault in the third degree, aggravated harassment in the second degree, and harassment in the second degree.

Majors has denied all charges.

The prosecution claimed that prior to the March incident, Majors threatened to take his own life in a series of texts in September 2022 when he said he was a monster incapable of love. The jury heard an audio clip of a conversation around that time in which the actor claimed he was a great man doing great things and urged Jabbari to be more like Michelle Obama and Coretta Scott King – the wives of former US president Barack Obama and Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

Majors, whose credits include Creed III, TV show Lovecraft Country, and this year’s Sundance selection Magazine Dreams, did not testify on his own behalf.

Defence attorney Priya Chaudhry said Jabbari was a liar and characterised her earlier in the trial as a former girlfriend out for revenge after the couple split up, adding that after the alleged assault in the car she left the vehicle and went to party with friends at a nightclub before returning to the home she shared with Majors.

If convicted, Majors faces up to one year in prison.