NEW YORK (AP) — Marine veteran Daniel Penny didn’t intend to kill a distressed man on a New York subway, but Penny “went way too far” in trying to neutralize someone he saw as a threat and not as a person, a prosecutor told jurors Friday. “The manner in which the defendant permanently silenced Jordan Neely evinced the defendant’s belief that Mr. Neely didn’t deserve even the minimum modicum of humanity,” prosecutor Dafna Yoran said in an opening statement at Penny’s manslaughter trial.
Penny’s “indifference toward Mr. Neely, the man whose life he was literally holding in his hands, caused him to disregard the most basic precautions and needlessly kill him, long after any threat he posed had dissipated,” she added. Defense lawyers were due to give their opening later Friday.
An anonymous Manhattan jury is deciding the manslaughter case surrounding Neely’s 2023 death, which prosecutors call a reckless killing but Penny claims was self-defense. The case has rattled fault lines surrounding race, homelessness, perceptions of public safety and bystanders’ responsibility. Penny’s critics see him as a white vigilante killer of a Black man who was behaving erratically and making dire statements but wasn’t armed and hadn’t assaulted or even touched anyone in the subway car.
Supporters credit the 25-year-old Penny with taking action to protect frightened subway riders — action that he has said was meant to defuse, not kill. Penny’s lawyer Steven Rai.
