Now that Daniel Penny has been totally acquitted on all charges of criminally negligent homicide that Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg brought against him in the wake of the death of Jordan Neely, Mr. Penny’s lawyers are looking for a way to strike back at DA Bragg. Explaining what might happen, Steven Raiser, Mr. Penny’s attorney, explained he is considering a malicious prosecution lawsuit, as he sees the case as having been unjust, brought for clearly political reasons rather than in the interest of justice.
As background, Mr. Penny was on a New York City subway car in 2023 when Jordan Neely, a 30-year-old homeless man with numerous prior arrests and charges, began shouting at passengers and behaving aggressively. Mr. Penny, a 26-year-old Marine veteran, tried restraining Neely and Neely died following the altercation. DA Bragg brought charges, but Penny was able to beat them.
Mr. Raiser has since appeared on “Fox & Friends.” Doing so on the morning of Wednesday, December 11, he told the show’s co-hosts that Mr. Penny’s prosecution was maliciously brought and ethically dubious at best. He said, “It’s not necessarily even about breaking the law.” He continued, “It’s blurring ethical boundaries and failing to act in the manner in which you are expected, because of your office.”
He then added that there was a clear political impetus for DA Bragg to bring the charges, given his need of re-election and the threat posed by an angry crowd. He said, “It was clear that there was a fear that if an arrest wasn’t made – and made very quickly – that there might be rioting in the streets, and that that may ultimately look very bad for District Attorney Alvin Bragg. And if that in fact happened, that could affect his re-election.”
Then, commenting on Dr. Jason Graham, New York City’s chief medical examiner, who signed off on the claim Neely died of strangulation even before Neely’s toxicology results had come back, Mr. Raiser said, “He was appointed by Mayor [Eric] Adams, same political party as Alvin Bragg. There was collusion there.”
Building on that point of collusion between the various parties involved in Mr. Penny’s persecution, the lawyer said, “And, I mean, the collusion began from the very beginning of this case and all the way through. The district attorney needed the medical examiner and needed the medical examiner to act quickly, and he did just that.”
Then, commenting on DA Bragg’s otherwise soft-on-crime approach, Mr. Raiser said, “There were some highlights that were put out there, quite extensively, in regards to this office’s practice of not prosecuting crime, and some very serious cases to talking about restorative justice and such, which, by the way, in some circumstances, that’s a great thing.”
He added, commenting on to what that approach leads, “But some brutal cases of an individual who attacked an 80-year-old man, mugging him and punching him and ultimately killing him, and yet you’re going to go after full-throated against my client, who you admit did a laudable thing and is a fine young man? Despicable.”
Watch him here:
