The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office has made the decision to charge Daniel Penny, a 24-year-old former Marine, in connection with the incident on a New York City subway train earlier this month involving a deranged homeless man named Jordan Neely. It is expected that Penny will turn himself in on Friday to face criminal charges. Penny was one of three individuals who helped subdue Neely to protect fellow passengers and is seen in video of the incident keeping Neely in a chokehold.
NBC 4 New York is told this decision to charge Daniel Penny was made by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office – and will happen without being presented to a grand jury at this time.
A Manhattan District Attorney spokesperson and NYPD spokesperson have not returned requests for what charge or charges might be filed Friday. Penny’s attorney did not returns calls for comment.
Penny’s attorneys have said previously there was no way he “could have foreseen” that his bid to subdue an alleged perceived threat would turn deadly.
Neely’s family says that amounts to a confession.
The possible charges are expected to come days after Neely’s death, and amid mounting public pressure over accountability following the medical examiner’s determination that the case was a homicide. It wasn’t clear if Bragg’s office intended to pursue charges against two other people seen restraining Neely in that video or if those people had yet been identified.
On May 1, at the Broadway-Lafayette station, witnesses reported that Jordan Neely was acting aggressively toward other passengers on a train. Neely is a career criminal with over 40 prior arrests for various offenses, including drug-related charges, disorderly conduct, and fare evasion. At the time of his death, Neely had an outstanding warrant for assaulting a 67-year-old woman. Multiple witnesses came forward to state that Neely had made repeated attempts to push people onto subway tracks.
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office is run by District Attorney Alvin Bragg, the same man who indicted Trump on erroneous charges back in March. In light of his decision to charge Trump with a felony over an alleged misdemeanor campaign finance violation, Bragg’s soft-on-crime policies came under scrutiny.
Under Bragg’s leadership, the Manhattan District Attorney’s office routinely downgrades felonies to misdemeanors. Yet sometimes, his decisions to pursue charges have seemingly been influenced by social or political factors. Earlier this year, Bragg also sought murder charges against Moussa Diarra, a parking garage attendant in Manhattan who had shot a thief in an act of self-defense. However, in response to public outrage, Bragg later decided not to pursue charges against Diarra.
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