A Toronto woman known as “chair girl” has been sentenced to a $2000 fine, two years of probation and 150 hours of community service after pleading guilty to throwing a chair off a downtown highrise balcony in February 2019.
Marcella Zoia will not face any jail time and will not have a social media ban.
The now-infamous viral video showed Zoia hurling a steel and wood chair off a balcony in the early morning where it narrowly missed the Gardiner Expressway before crashing to the ground below.
Prosecutors had argued that the 20-year-old should spend months in prison, receive counselling and be banned from social media.
However, Zoia’s lawyer Greg Leslie argued no jail time was necessary, stating her decision to hurl the chair over the 45th-floor balcony was due to alcohol and peer pressure.
Zoia pleaded guilty to mischief causing danger to life.
No injuries were reported but in an agreed statement of facts heard earlier, surveillance footage from the condo building showed there were several people walking through the area at the time of the incident, including a woman with a child in a stroller.
The incident sparked outrage outline when it was posted in February, leading to criticism from the city’s mayor and a police request for the public’s help in identifying the woman.
Zoia surrendered to police a short time later.
Leslie called Tuesday’s sentence “abundantly fair” and said Zoia is working to turn her life around.
—With files from The Canadian Press