Daniel Penny, the 24-year-old Marine Corps veteran who put Jordan Neely in a fatal chokehold on the New York City subway last month, spoke out about the encounter for the first time this week and said he doesn’t regret stepping in to restrain Neely.
Neely, who had a history of mental illness, was throwing garbage on the F train on May 1 and yelling that he wanted to die or go to jail because he was tired of having no food when Penny placed him in a chokehold.
Penny, who was charged with second-degree manslaughter, could face up to 15 years in prison but says he does not regret his decision to step in and restrain Neely.
“If [Neely] had carried out his threats, he would have killed somebody,” Penny told Fox News.
The former Marine said he was so traumatized by the experience he has not been on a subway since.
A three-and-a-half minute long video captured by a witness begins with Neely already in a chokehold. Shortly after, a second rider pins down Neely’s arms. Thirty seconds into the video, Neely begins to flail his arms and try to escape Penny’s grasp. Then the third man enters to help pin Neely to the floor.
More than two minutes into the video, Neely begins going limp. Another witness can be heard off camera telling Penny, “You’re going to kill him now, he’s defecated on himself.” One of the men restraining Neely said it was an old stain on his pants and that Neely was not “squeezing.”
“He’s not squeezing? All right. You’ve got to let him go. After he’s defecated himself that’s it,” the off-camera witness said.
The man holding Neely’s arms down then let go and asked Neely if he could hear him. When Neely failed to respond, Penny released him. Seconds later, Penny and the other man moved Neely into a recovery position. After three minutes and 45 seconds of video, Neely’s body contorted and let out a deep breath. The witness who recorded the video later said, “None of us who were there thought he was in danger of dying. We thought he just passed out or ran out of air.”
The city medical examiner ruled the death a homicide caused by “compression of neck (chokehold).”
Penny told Fox News this week that he felt a moral obligation to act. He recalled Eli Wiesel telling his own high school class that during the Holocaust many “good people did nothing.” “It’s a lesson that I carry with me to this day,” he said.
Penny described being “scared” when Neely got onto the train at the Second Avenue station in Manhattan and began screaming and threatening passengers.
“Between stops, you’re trapped on the train, and there’s nowhere to go. You can try to move away, but you can only do so much on a packed car,” Penny said. “I was scared. I looked around, and I saw older women and children, and they were terrified.”
He declined to discuss what happened next, according to the outlet.
A woman of color who was on the train during the incident previously told Fox News she believed it was “self-defense” and that “I believe in my heart that he saved a lot of people that day.”
While Neely’s family has filed a wrongful death suit against Penny, the former Marine said he feels for them.
“They’ve been in my prayers. I feel for their loss,” he said. “Like Jordan, they’re also victims of a failed system.”
Neely struggled with mental-health issues, including schizophrenia, PTSD and depression, according to his aunt. He had been arrested 42 times, including four times for assault. At the time of his death, Neely had an active warrant for allegedly assaulting a 67-year-old woman in 2021.
Neely was arrested in August 2015 for attempted kidnapping “after he was seen dragging a 7-year-old girl down an Inwood street,” the New York Daily News reported. He pled guilty to endangering the welfare of a child and was sentenced to four months in jail. He was later arrested again in June 2019 for punching a 64-year-old man in the face during a fight in a Greenwich Village subway station, the report adds.
Reddit posts unearthed by journalist Andy Ngo show that subway riders had grown to fear Neely even nine years ago because of his erratic behavior. He was also on a NYC Department of Homeless Services list of homeless people who had dire needs, the “Top 50” list, according to the New York Times.
Penny, meanwhile, was labeled a “murderer” and a racist over Neely’s death.
“The majority of the people on that train that I was protecting were minorities, so it definitely hurts a lot to be called that,” Penny said. “It has obviously taken a toll.”
Penny, who is free on $100,000 bond as his case moves forward, received funding to cover his legal fees from a GiveSendGo campaign that raised nearly $3 million.
“I was working two jobs as a student,” Penny said. “My family doesn’t come from money, so I’m incredibly thankful for this fund and all the people who have supported me.”