New York City Police Department (NYPD) bodycam footage of officers and medics rendering aid to homeless subway rider Jordan Neely after an alleged chokehold by straphanger and former U.S. Marine Daniel Penny shows Neely had a detectable pulse.
The video emerged Friday in the Manhattan Supreme Court as Penny’s trial got underway, nearly 18 months after the May 1, 2023 incident, the New York Post reported.
Penny, 26, faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted of manslaughter. He pleaded not guilty and said his actions were not racially motivated. Black Lives Matter (BLM) protesters reportedly demanded Penny’s conviction as Penny made his way into the courtroom. (RELATED: Daniel Penny’s Attorney Explains Why He’s Optimistic Manhattan Jury Won’t Try To ‘Right Racial Wrongs’ In His Case)
In the video, NYPD officers rush to the subway train at the Broadway-Lafayette station in the NoHo neighborhood of Lower Manhattan. A witness identifies Penny, who then steps forward. Responding to the officers’ questions about whether Neely had weapons on him, Penny says, “I don’t know. I just put him out,” while making an X sign with his arms appearing to signify a chokehold.
“You got a pulse or no?” asks an officer.
“I feel a pulse,” another answers.
“He breathing right?” the other officer asks.
A medic is then seen giving Neely chest compressions as bystanders watch.
“He’s unconscious now, he’s not breathing,” another says.
NYPD Officer Teodoro Tejada was the first to testify, the NY Post reported. Neely had a “faint pulse,” Tejada told the court, but officers could not find it minutes later. He reportedly searched Neely for possible weapons but only found a muffin in Neely’s pocket.
Andre Zachery, Neely’s father, wept as he watched the video in court, the NY Post reported.
Two other NYPD officers and workers from New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority also reportedly testified.
One of the officers said the police team did not perform mouth-to-mouth resuscitation as Neely “was an apparent drug user” and “very dirty” and “would have been vomiting” on regaining consciousness, the Daily Mail reported. The NYPD sergeant also claimed his officers risked contracting hepatitis.
Officers also reportedly used a defibrillator and administered a shot of the opioid antagonist Narcan.
Neely’s autopsy report revealed he had K2, synthetic marijuana, in his body system, Penny’s defense argued.
“This is a case about a young man who did for others what we would want someone to do for us,” Penny’s lawyer Thomas Kenniff argued in Penny’s defense during his opening remarks, the New York Post reported.
A “seething, psychotic” Neely demanded food and money from fellow riders, threatened to kill and spoke of going to Rikers Island and life imprisonment —messaging which struck fear and incited panic in the riders, including a mother who shielded her child while huddling behind a bench, Kenniff argued. Penny’s response “doesn’t have to make him a hero … [but] it doesn’t make him a killer,” Kenniff argued.
Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Dafna Yoran told jurors Penny “was so reckless with Mr. Neely’s life because he didn’t recognize his humanity” and that Penny went “way too far” when he “took it upon himself to take down Mr. Neely, to neutralize him” in the nearly six-minute “deadly chokehold,” Yoran added.
“He, quite literally, went for the jugular,” Yoran alleged concerning Penny.
Neely family lawyer Donte Mills claimed Penny used his training to kill rather than save Neely.
Neely, 30, was reportedly a subway busker and Michael Jackson impersonator who was homeless and mentally ill. His death sparked protests by BLM supporters. The NYPD found a Molotov cocktail at one such protest and arrested 11 protesters.