SOCIETY MADE CHOICES THAT PUT NEELY ON F TRAIN
WASHINGTON — By all accounts, Jordan Neely was sometimes a delight, often a nuisance. On rare occasions, he was an actual menace. But he did not deserve to die, and the man who killed him on a New York subway train last week should be held accountable.
Neely’s death, officially ruled a homicide, sparked angry protests and a revival of a familiar chant: “No justice, no peace.” He was a 30-year-old Black man, homeless and mentally ill, who survived by performing in the streets and the subway as a Michael Jackson impersonator. The man who choked him to death on the F train in Manhattan last Monday, Daniel Penny, is a 24-year-old white former Marine who reacted to Neely’s hostile — but not violent — behavior.
The death was captured on cellphone video by an onlooker in the subway car. Penny was questioned by police and released without being charged.
Anyone who has encountered an aggressive panhandler or an incoherent screamer in the claustrophobic confines of a New York subway car knows how uncomfortable the experience is. You try to avoid eye contact. You try not to draw attention to yourself. You assess the logistics of moving to another car. You make a judgment call: Does this out-of-control person pose a physical threat to me or to others? Or is this just something unpleasant that must be endured until the next stop?
It later was said that Neely “didn’t seem like he wanted to hurt anyone.” But a statement released by lawyers representing Penny claims that Neely was “aggressively threatening Daniel Penny and the other passengers,” and that Penny and others “acted to protect themselves.”
Penny put Neely in a chokehold. That maneuver is dangerous because if it is done wrong, with pressure on a person’s windpipe, it can kill. Neely kicked and struggled for at least two minutes before going limp. The medical examiner deemed the death a homicide.
It will be up to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to decide whether to file charges against Penny. The facts about the incident that have emerged thus far do not support the claim by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez that Neely was “murdered.” But neither does what we know about Penny’s actions suggest he should be given a pass. It cannot be acceptable to launch a preemptive physical attack against someone who has done nothing more than be rude and obnoxious.
After all, it is we, as a society, who put Jordan Neely on that F train. In every U.S. city, there are encampments of homeless Americans who struggle with mental illness and addiction. We see them on our sidewalks, in our parks, beneath our underpasses, and we hurry past.
Neely’s story was like that of so many other men and women who have fallen through the cracks. When he was 14, his life was derailed by trauma — his mother was murdered by her boyfriend. He dropped out of high school and fell into a cycle of mental illness, homelessness and drug use, scraping out a living by charming Times Square tourists and subway riders with his dance moves.
He had “hundreds of encounters” with social workers from the city and various nonprofit groups, according to The New York Times, and was on the city’s “Top 50” list of homeless people most urgently in need of help. He was arrested and hospitalized dozens of times — but quickly released or discharged.
We have neither the legal framework nor the inpatient facilities to compel an adult such as Neely to receive the kind of effective, long-term treatment that might have changed his life. We live with the consequences.
In November 2021, Neely committed an act of real violence: He punched a woman in the face, breaking her nose. He was charged with assault and sent to jail pending trial. Earlier this year, he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to live at a Bronx treatment facility, take his medication and stay clean for 15 months. He left the place after 13 days.
We now mourn the death of a man whose humanity we preferred to ignore.