Jury selection begins Monday in the trial of a Marine veteran accused of manslaughter in the strangling death of an unstable and aggressive subway passenger who appeared on a cellphone video.
Passenger Jordan Neely, 30, later died. He had a history of mental illness and a criminal history, including past allegations of violence on the New York City subway.
Daniel Penny, 25, could face up to 19 years in prison if convicted of manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide.
Veteran of subway vigilante incident was not told during interrogation that he threatened passengers and killed man
Daniel Penny returns after a break during a pretrial hearing Thursday, Oct. 3, 2024, at New York's Supreme Criminal Court in Manhattan. Penny, a Marine Corps veteran, will be charged with second-degree manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide in 2023. Jordan Neely died on the New York City subway. (Julia Bonavita/FOX News Digital)
“Our team looks forward to beginning the jury selection process and ultimately selecting a fair and impartial jury that will exonerate Danny of any wrongdoing,” said one of Penny's attorneys. Thomas Kenniff told Fox News Sunday before the proceeding.
The veteran's attorney previously told Fox News Digital that there was “overwhelming evidence that the actions Danny took to protect train commuters were justified.”
But lawyers for Neely's family take a different view.
“This case is simple: Someone was screaming on the train, and someone else choked them to death,” said attorney Donte Mills. “These two cannot and never will be balanced.”
Daniel Penny, key witness in Jordan Neely case, refuses to cooperate with Da Bragg's office: Report
A screenshot of bystander video showing Jordan Neely (left) being strangled on the New York City subway. (Luces de Nueva York/Juan Alberto Vazquez, via Storyful)
He argued that the riots did not justify Penney's intervention.
“Jordan was entitled to his own space,” he continued. “He wasn't allowed to get on that train, he wasn't even allowed to scream. He didn't touch anyone. He wasn't a passenger on that train, he wasn't a visitor in New York or in this country. Jordan. was allowed to exist and Penny ceased to exist simply because “Penny believed that she was more important than Jordan. ”
Dozens of Neeley supporters wearing “Malcolm Some blamed “white supremacist violence.”
According to testimony at a motion hearing last month, Neely forced his way onto the train past the 10th Street station, ripped off his jacket and threatened to “kill anyone” in May 2023.
Daniel Penny is escorted from the 5th Precinct Station in Manhattan on May 12, 2023 in New York. (Barry Williams/New York Daily News/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
“He was acting like a lunatic, like a crazy person,” Penny later told detectives. He said Neely threw away his jacket and then yelled something like, “If I don't get this, this, and this, I'm going to jail forever.”
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There were women and children on the train, and Penny said she felt threatened. When Neely came in on him, he put him in a chokehold, he said.
“I'm not trying to kill the guy,” he told detectives. “I'm just trying to de-escalate the situation.”
He said two other men on the train helped hold Neely down while they waited for police to arrive. The man was still breathing when they let go, and when investigators later interviewed Penny in the police building, she said she had not told them the man had died.
