Protesters Try to Swarm Daniel Penny as Judge Rejects Motion to Dismiss Jordan Neely Manslaughter Case

A Manhattan judge on Wednesday rejected former Marine Daniel Penny’s motion to dismiss the charges against him in the subway chokehold death of Jordan Neely — in what an attorney for the slain homeless man’s family called a “big win.”

Daniel Penny, ex-marine who placed Jordan Neely in a chokehold on the subway leading to his death, turns himself into the NYPD 5th Precinct. (Credit Image: © Edna Leshowitz/ZUMA Press Wire)

Jordan Neely in Daniel Penny’s headlock

Judge Maxwell Wiley batted down Penny’s attorneys’ October motion to can the manslaughter case because of alleged issues with prosecutors’ instructions to the grand jury and claims that the medical examiner didn’t establish that Penny’s actions killed Neely.

But Wiley  ruled that the ME’s testimony and Neely’s death certificate —  which said the former Michael Jackson impersonator died from “compression of the neck (chokehold) — was more than enough to “establish that defendant’s actions caused the death of Neely.”

He also wrote that the court reviewed the grand jury presentation and found it had been properly done.

Penny, a former infantry squad leader who was indicted on charges of second-degree manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide the caught-on-camera, lightning-rod May 2023 killing, was hurried into a waiting black Lexus SUV after the hearing — as sign wielding protesters tried to swarm him outside Manhattan Criminal Court.

“We’re gonna’ get your ass, cracker!” one man screamed through a megaphone as he bounded around the car. “Daniel Penny is a murderer! He’s a murderer! You a murderer!

“There’s a murderer in this car! He choked out a New Yorker!” the man continued {snip}

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Neely — who had a long history of mental illness — had been threatening subway riders on the train that day before Penny stepped behind him and sunk the chokehold that the city’s medical examiner says eventually killed Neely.

Penny has said he didn’t intend to do that, but felt he had to step in and protect other straphangers because Neely was throwing trash and screaming that he was willing to “kill a motherf—er” and “take a bullet” and go to jail.

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