BLM Leader Calls For ‘Black Vigilantes’ Following Daniel Penny Verdict

The Daniel Penny verdict has been met with threats by at least one high-profile activist hoping he would be convicted of killing Jordan Neely, who was threatening people on a New York City subway train last year.

After Penny was found not guilty of the criminally negligent homicide of Neely, the founder of Black Lives Matter (BLM) of Greater New York, Hawk Newsome, called on black people to attack white people in the city.

“We need some black vigilantes,” Newsome said during a press conference. “People wanna jump up and choke us and kill us for being loud? How about we do the same when they attempt to oppress us.”

“We need some black vigilantes!”

New York BLM leader Hawk Newsome after Daniel Penny’s acquittal.pic.twitter.com/lsz5QCphhn

— Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) December 9, 2024

The trial has also inspired vandalism.

Last week, law enforcement said that nine suspects who boarded the northbound F train at the Neptune Avenue station around 4:24 a.m. allegedly plastered the interior of the car with messages that said: “A man was lynched here,” according to AMNY. The statements are believed to be a reference to Neely, who died after Penny subdued him in a chokehold to keep him from hurting other passengers.

While Neely’s official cause of death is asphyxiation, Dr. Satish Chundru, a forensic pathologist, testified for the defense that Penny’s chokehold did not result in Neely’s death.

“In your opinion, did Mr. Penny choke Mr. Neely to death?” Steven Raiser, one of Penny’s defense attorneys, asked Chundru on the stand.

“No,” Chundru replied, “The chokehold did not cause death.”

Chundru also testified that Neely’s death was the result of “the combined effects of sickle cell crisis, the schizophrenia, the struggle and restraint, and the synthetic marijuana,” Fox News reported. He said that someone high on synthetic marijuana with schizophrenia can die while involved in a struggle, even without a chokehold being used. Chundru went on to say that even if Neely hadn’t had those other health factors, he still would not have died from Penny’s chokehold.

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Chundru said he ruled the chokehold out as the cause of death because there were other factors, and he pointed out discrepancies in Neely’s records. He said that Neely’s medical records were inconsistent when it came to bruising on his neck and stated there were “almost negligible” tiny bleeding spots on his eyelids. Chundru said these discrepancies were not consistent with a fatal chokehold, the New York Post reported at the time.

Jurors deliberated most of last week on whether Penny was responsible for “recklessly” causing the death of Neely as part of a charge of manslaughter in the second degree. On Friday, they told Judge Maxwell Wiley that they could not come to a unanimous decision on that count of the indictment, so Wiley allowed Assistant District Attorney Dafna Yoran to drop the charge and allow the jury to deliberate on a lesser charge of criminally negligent homicide.

When the jury returned on Monday to deliberate the lesser charge, it took them less than an hour to find Penny not guilty.