There Are No Former Marines

The acquittal of Marine Daniel Penny by a jury is a verdict for common sense. It is good to see New Yorkers deliver a unanimous “not guilty” decision in respect of the fatal encounter between Mr. Penny and Jordan Neely on an uptown F train at lower Manhattan. The presiding judge, Maxwell Wiley, had earlier dismissed the prosecution’s most serious charge, for manslaughter. Mr. Penny had moved for a mistrial. Now, he has an acquittal.That acquittal is also a verdict on District Attorney Alvin Bragg — and not a positive one. These pages noted on Friday that a deputy of Mr. Bragg, Dafna Yoran, who prosecuted the case, appeared to be angling for a compromise verdict, a strategy the judge furthered by refusing to call a mistrial. The jury, which had been deadlocked on the manslaughter charge, today refused to find that Mr. Penny was negligent. He still faces a civil suit from Neely’s father.Talk about sliding doors. Our Marie Pohl relates how Neely just barely made the train — he stuck his hand in the doors as they closed.* Also in that car was Mr. Penny, an architecture student, who was heading to the gym. One witness described Neely’s behavior as “Satanic,” and another found him to be so “belligerent and unhinged” that she hid her five year old child behind a stroller. Mr. Penny put him in a chokehold for six minutes, and Neely subsequently died.There is no doubt that Neely’s death was a tragedy. A sometime impersonator of Michael Jackson at Times Square, Neely had been arrested more than 40 times and had a history of drug abuse and mental illness. He was not armed the day he died, though many witnesses perceived him to be threatening. There is also, in our mind, no doubt that Mr. Penny leapt into action for the most admirable motives, and at some risk to himself.The thing we kept thinking during the trial is a point that every young editor is taught during his or her travails on the copy desk — there are no former Marines. Mr. Penny may be a student of architecture, but he is still a Marine. So he did what Marines are trained to do when confronted with a sudden danger. He wheeled on the threat, confronted it, and, breasting the risk, protected those who might be in danger. When the verdict the jury brought in was announced in court, there was applause from the Penny kith and angry jeers from Neely’s partisans, some of whom shouted allegations of racism. We were sad to read of it. If we were looking for racists, the last place in America we would look would be the Marine Corps and the other branches of our armed forces. We’re not saying they’re devoid of racism, but it would be harder to find in the Marines and other services.We suspect the jury understood that. It clearly credited Mr. Penny’s defense. It would not surprise us if, years hence, New Yorkers look back at this day as a turning point. Had the verdict been guilty, would anyone again have leapt to defend our straphangers? The acquittal means that from Mr. Penny’s actions, other New Yorkers will take courage. And, they can hope, our subways will be safer than they were for the example set by a young Marine. ________________*Correction: Neely placed his hand in the closing subway doors. The identity of that individual was misstated in the bulldog edition.

There Are No Former Marines

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