Daniel Penny Is Being Treated Like He’s a Cop

In the days since Daniel Penny killed Jordan Neely, condemnation of the act has been…scattered. While several local politicians have condemned the chokehold death of a lifelong New Yorker, others, including the mayor, have wavered. The New York Times, even this morning, continues to publish pieces that deflect blame away from Penny for killing Neely. 

On Friday, when it came to finally charging Penny, a former marine from Long Island, he was given a treatment often reserved for high-profile celebrities like Harvey Weinstein or the rare cop who has killed someone and then is actually prosecuted. His surrender, arrest, and bail were worked out with his lawyers beforehand (a rarity for those charged with manslaughter, according to public defenders), and within just a few hours of arriving at Chinatown's Fifth Precinct, he was back on his way home—to continue his life while awaiting trial. 

There's also another distinctly cop-like development around Penny—a sizable crowdfunding campaign, which has been touted by people like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Penny's GiveSendGo campaign has raised nearly $2 million for Penny's legal defense. Any excess money, his legal team says, will be spent on "mental health advocacy." On the other side of the crowdfunding equation is the family of Jordan Neely, who has raised just over $124,000 to bury their family member. 

The clear pattern that we've seen play out here, and in Wisconsin and Missouri and across the country, is that if you give a little light to the idea that someone deserved to die, should have been killed, then many Americans will overwhelmingly respond with their wallets. At the same time, in the same city, the NYPD cops who killed Kawaski Trawick are working overtime to make clear that another mentally ill Black man in New York City had to die (all this in an effort to escape only getting fired, or, most likely, only being stripped of vacation days). It's tough to see where just acting like a cop (killing Black men) and actually being a cop (where you get to kill Black men) gets you treated any differently.

Some links to start your post-Mother's Day Monday (take an Advil, mom!): 

• VICE is cashed (heading for bankruptcy). 
• New York prison graveyards must now name the people buried at specific gravesites. 
• Instead of making families wait months in crowded shelters before receiving housing vouchers, the City could save millions by just giving them vouchers.
• Eric Adams said NYC public schools should emulate the city's yeshivas (which consistently fail to teach adequate reading and writing skills).  
• Also man, this Eric Adams guy? Not very progressive? Also killing universal Pre-K. 
• The battle over public space in Sunset Park and a now-stopped but once booming unlicensed market.
• New border restrictions from the Biden administration have slowed the number of migrants crossing the border and coming to NYC after the end of Title 42 last week. Even with the smaller numbers, NYC is still sending migrants to far-flung sites (including in deep Brooklyn and upstate New York), to find space to house them. At the same time, NYC has opened another new shelter, and a migrant arrival center in the shuttered Roosevelt Hotel, meant to connect migrants to social services.  
• An NYPD officer shoved a Brooklyn man while he was holding his 20-month-old. 
• Resident doctors in Queens are on strike. 
• Remember the Excelsior Pass? Neither do we. But we're still paying a lot of money for it!
• And finally, need food stamps in New York? Get ready to wait…and wait…