Daniel Penny, the former Marine charged with manslaughter in the subway chokehold death of Jordan Neely, believes the disturbed homeless man “would have killed somebody” if he had acted on the threats he yelled at other passengers, according to a new interview.
Penny, 24, told Fox News Digital he felt an obligation to step in when Neely, a 30-year-old former street performer with a history of mental illness, exploded into a verbal tirade May 1 on an F train in Lower Manhattan.
“If [Neely] had carried out his threats, he would have killed somebody,” Penny told the outlet in an article published Thursday.
The Long Island native said he was influenced by Elie Wiesel, the late civil rights activist and Holocaust survivor, who spoke to his high school class after they read “Night,” the author’s memoir based on his experiences as a Jewish prisoner in Nazi concentration camps.
“One of the overall messages that he talked about was that good people did nothing,” Penny told Fox. “It’s a lesson that I carry with me to this day.”
The former infantry squad leader also stressed what he considered the seriousness of Neely’s threats, which witnesses have said included statements that he wasn’t afraid to go to jail or “take a bullet.”
“Between stops, you’re trapped on the train, and there’s nowhere to go,” Penny told Fox.
“You can try to move away, but you can only do so much on a packed car,” he continued. “I was scared. I looked around, and I saw older women and children, and they were terrified.”
Penny said he hasn’t been on a train since that day, when he seized Neely from behind, wrapped his arms around Neely’s neck and strangled him with a grappling technique known as a rear naked choke.
Penny’s attorneys, with the Manhattan law firm Raiser & Kenniff, have said their client acted in self-defense. He feared for his safety, they have said, and only stepped in “to protect himself and his fellow New Yorkers.”
A freelance journalist who happened to be on the subway recorded the tail end of the fatal encounter, and the footage sparked immediate outrage after its release.
The city medical examiner ruled Neely’s death a homicide, finding he died from “compression of the neck.”
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office has since charged Penny with second-degree manslaughter, which could put him behind bars for as much as 15 years if convicted.
Penny surrendered to cops on May 12. He described his arrest — and the subsequent perp walk — as a difficult affair.
“It was a little bit humiliating, I would say, but, I mean, it is what it is,” Penny told Fox. “That’s how things are playing out.”
A grand jury was impaneled earlier in June to hear the evidence against him, according to reports.
He is free on $100,000 bail. An online fund drive has raised nearly $3 million for his legal expenses.
Neely, a former street performer who often impersonated Michael Jackson, had a history of psychosis but slipped through the cracks of the Big Apple’s mental health system.
His family has blamed authorities for not getting him the help he so desperately needed — and has called on the DA to charge Penny with murder.
At Neely’s funeral, civil rights activist Rev. Al Sharpton gave a fiery eulogy that skewered authorities’ decision to not immediately charge Penny, who was initially questioned by cops and released.
“Who thought it was all right for this man to choke a brother to death and go home to see his family?” Sharpton asked.
Penny, in his first public comments since the deadly encounter, told The Post that he would likely act the same way if put in a similar position.
“You know, I live an authentic and genuine life,” Penny said last month. “And I would — if there was a threat and danger in the present …”
He told Fox that he empathized with Neely’s family.
“They’ve been in my prayers. I feel for their loss,” he said. “Like Jordan, they’re also victims of a failed system.”
