Man charged over Jordan Neely killing says ‘I’m not a white supremacist’
The retired US marine who has been charged with manslaughter after he placed a fellow New York City subway rider in a deadly chokehold has denied that he was acting as a vigilante, insisting “I’m not a white supremacist … I’m a normal guy.”
Daniel Penny, who is white, defended his conduct in an interview with the New York Post. He expressed sadness but showed no personal remorse about the death of Jordan Neely, a 30-year-old Black man who had been struggling with mental illness and lack of housing.
“I’m deeply saddened by the loss of life,” Penny, 24, said. “It’s tragic what happened to him. Hopefully we can change the system that’s so desperately failed us.”
Neely died on 1 May in a confrontation that was recorded by an onlooker on video. Eyewitnesses reported that he had been shouting on the F train and begging for money but had not been violent towards other passengers when he was dragged to the ground and gripped around his neck by Penny for several minutes.
The killing sparked a debate about racism, homelessness and vigilantism in New York. At Neely’s funeral at a church in Harlem on Friday, the civil rights activist and pastor Al Sharpton, delivering the eulogy, called Penny’s actions a crime that exposed the brutal treatment of individuals in need.
“People keep criminalizing people that need help,” Sharpton said. “They don’t need abuse – they need help.”
The medical examiner has ruled Neely’s death a homicide caused by “compression of neck (chokehold)”. Neely’s family has called for his death to be prosecuted as murder.
The New York Post asked Penny whether he would act the same way if he found himself in a similar situation. He replied: “You know, I live an