CNN
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A Manhattan grand jury has voted to indict Daniel Penny, the Marine veteran who held Jordan Neely in a fatal chokehold on the New York City subway, according to a source with knowledge of the case.
Penny, 24, was indicted on second-degree manslaughter charges.
Penny surrendered to police last month to face a second-degree manslaughter charge. He has since been out on a $100,000 bond.
Penny held Neely, a homeless man and street artist, in a chokehold on the subway train May 1 after Neely began shouting at passengers that he was hungry and thirsty and didn’t care whether he died. Penny forced 30-year-old Neely to the train floor and restrained him in a chokehold until he stopped breathing. A medical examiner ruled Neely’s death a homicide.
CNN has reached out to Penny’s attorneys and the attorneys representing Neely’s family.
In May, Penny told the New York Post he was “deeply saddened by the loss of life,” amid what has become a contentious homicide case that has highlighted the city’s handling of unhoused people.
Neely was on a New York City Department of Homeless Services list of the city’s homeless with acute needs – sometimes referred to internally as the “Top 50” list – because people on the list tend to disappear, a source told CNN.
Penny told the newspaper he would take action in a similar situation again, “if there was a threat and danger in the present.” Penny said he is not a White supremacist and race was not a factor.
In response to the May interview, Neely family attorneys called Penny a “killer.”
“This is an advertisement to soften the public’s view of Daniel Penny who choked Jordan Neely to death. We never called him a White supremacist, we called him a killer,” attorneys Donte Mills and Lennon Edwards said at the time. “We want to know why he didn’t let go of that chokehold until Jordan was dead.”
Neely’s killing, part of which was captured on video that was posted online, sparked demonstrations calling for justice in his case as Manhattan prosecutors spent days deliberating how to proceed before apprehending and charging Penny.
