This is Pastor Tim’s newspaper article which appeared in the Evening Leader on Tuesday, Dec 3
I wrote a couple of weeks ago about the Deniel Penny case. More details in the case have been made public and I wanted to give you an update on his situation. As I write this article, the closing arguments are sent to begin Monday, Dec 2. They are currently on break for Thanksgiving.
For those of you unfamiliar with the Daniel Penny case, he is the former Marine who was riding on a New York subway when Jordan Neely boarded the subway and began harassing and threatening the passengers. He was screaming he was going to kill someone and did not care if he went to prison. Penny subdued Neely using a choke hold he was trained to use in the Marines. At the next stop, the subway was stopped, and the police were called. Neely was unconscious but still had a pulse when the police arrived. Neely later passed away.
Penny was later arrested and charged in connection with the death of Neely. I have been following the trial trying to figure out what law Penny broke in coming to the defense of the people on the subway. Since then, the medical examiner took the stand and explained that Neely died of a drug overdose, a detail that if the prosecution did not know that before charging Penny, they were negligent in their investigation and that is the kind interpretation of what happened.
Penny is facing 15 years in prison for defending the men, women and children on that subway car. I will be the first one to admit, Penny had no way to know Neely’s background on that day. He was a man riding a subway car who saw a threat that he was confident he could address, and he did, much to the relief of the passengers on the subway. So, the fact that Neely was a homeless drug addict who had clear mental illness was not information that Penny had that day. Neely’s family, who are on the news crying about what happened, knew his background and did nothing about it.
I will tell you right now that I pray to God if I was in that situation, I would be as brave as Daniel Penny. And if my courage failed and I did not act, I pray that someone else would be as brave as Daniel Penny to protect the people who are there.
How could we do this? How could we prosecute this man? I want to write this article and encourage all of you men to stand up like Penny did in this situation, but I have to hesitate. I will be the first to admit that we function with a little more common sense around here than they do in places like New York, I will also admit that no one is being threatened on a subway in St Marys (unless you are ordering a sandwich, I guess), but the principle remains. Daniel Penny broke no laws. He took down what he perceived to be a public threat, a threat that was verified by his fellow passengers.
I am sure that based on his lawyer’s advice, Penny has made no public statements. So, I have no basis to speculate on what he is going through right now other than comparing it to what I would feel with the threat of 15 years in prison was hanging over me. He is celebrating Thanksgiving wondering if he will be in a jail cell in less than a week all because he was brave enough to stand up for innocent people who were using public transportation. This simply should not be.
Even if the jury gives the correct not guilty verdict, Penny will not be able to go back to the life he once had. I do not know his family situation, but my belief is that he will have to move out of New York after this because of the notoriety he has because of this trial. Rather than being given the hero’s welcome he deserves, he will have to start over with a new life. I just pray that life will not be in the prison system.
Everything about this situation is awful. My heart breaks for Jordan Neely, a broken man who needed someone who cared about him to help him. I am sad for the Penny family and the life he left behind because of a brave stand made at a crucial moment. And I feel bad for the next time there is a public threat made and men who could do something will hesitate because of fear of reprisal by a vindictive and corrupt judicial system. There is no upside to any of this situation. So, I ask you to join me in prayer for justice to prevail so that this bad situation is not made worse by setting a terrible precedent of prosecuting heroic actions.