All through his manslaughter trial, Daniel Penny has been stoic, disciplined and impassive — by no means cracking a smile or a annoyed grimace.
His posture is so straight, you possibly can cling a portray flush towards his again. The 26-year-old’s been a clean slate for anybody to challenge upon. Is he a former jarhead adrift? A chilly loner who instructed cops that he “put [Jordan Neely] out.” A vigilante, as protesters outdoors the courtroom have referred to as him?
He’s none of these issues.
In keeping with character witnesses — together with two Marine Corps sergeants who served with him, childhood mates, his siblings and his mom — “Danny’s” straight face belies a “softness” and compassion. He stays a person related to his childhood roots in West Islip, Lengthy Island, the place the surfer was a lacrosse standout and performed bass in native orchestras.
“He was so kind. If anything he was extra kind … He always spoke up,” Penny’s childhood buddy Alexandra Fay instructed the jury Monday.
A case for canonization, this hardly makes. However, then once more, this isn’t a person who belongs behind a protection desk combating prices of manslaughter and criminally negligent murder.
On Monday, the prosecution rested after a grueling three days of testimony from health worker Dr. Cynthia Harris, who mentioned that Jordan Neely was killed solely by Penny’s chokehold even when, it turned out, Neely had sufficient medicine in him “to put down an elephant.”
Penny’s protection began as information was breaking about madman and violent legal Ramon Rivera fatally stabbing three harmless strangers in a spree throughout Manhattan — a reminder of the true and random terror that has been unleashed onto the residents of New York Metropolis by progressive insurance policies.
First, Penny’s lawyer Thomas Kenniff referred to as the defendant’s sister Jackie, who spoke of their shut relationship, their outdoorsy childhood and his bond with their grandparents, strengthened after their mother and father’ divorce.
Then Gina Flaim-Penny mentioned her son wished to go to the Naval Academy at Annapolis. When he didn’t get accepted, regardless of his good grades and lacrosse expertise, Penny joined the Marines, which made her “nervous.”
The mom’s nerves have been on show whereas on the stand. Requested if she was testifying honestly, she mentioned sure and uttered one thing so softly I couldn’t make it out, however her face was clearly contorted to carry within the anguish.
Penny’s former platoon sergeant Nolan Drylie described the Marine veteran as “above reproach” and detailed how Penny gained a Humanitarian Service Medal for his reduction work throughout Hurricane Florence in 2018.
Gunnery Sgt. Nathaniel Dunchie, who now lives in Texas, spoke about Penny’s acumen as a Marine and his acceptance of all.
The prosecution countered by noting that Penny’s buddy Fay had donated to his GoFundMe protection fund, however Choose MaxwellWiley shut down that line of questioning. And, in a grimy Hail Mary, they tried to stain each Marines by citing previous social media posts — an try to counter their judgement as peaceable folks.
In a play to Manhattanites’ anti-gun sensibilities, one of many assistant DAs introduced up an innocuous video Dunchie posted on TikTok, displaying him revealing a gun inside his fanny pack, accompanied by audio that claims “no one will know.”
Kenniff requested if Texans have totally different attitudes towards weapons, including, “Are you a criminal?”
“No I am not,” Dunchie mentioned.
And neither is Penny.
All of this testimony introduced the defendant to life — making a portrait of a peaceable and compassionate man hardwired to intervene on behalf of strangers in want.
It was a placing distinction to the afternoon, when forensic psychiatrist Alexander Bardey took the stand. The physician testified that he reviewed between 4,000 and 5,000 pages of Neely’s psychiatric historical past, relationship from 2015 to 2021 and together with greater than a dozen hospitalizations.
Bardey mentioned the most typical diagnoses have been schizophrenia and abuse of the artificial drug K2, describing Neely’s case as “severe.”
Medical data revealed Neely’s paranoid fears that individuals wished to harm him and his perception that rapper Tupac Shakur, who died in 1996,wished to make use of him to vary the world.
Neely, who additionally had a historical past of violence, was a hazard to himself — and to different New Yorkers.
Penny sensed that. And, regardless of the DA’s assertions in opening statements that he “didn’t recognize [Neely’s] humanity,” the ex Marine noticed humanity throughout him on that F prepare in Could of 2023 and determined to behave.
