Daniel Penny's jurors told the jury they could not agree on a manslaughter charge

NEW YORK – Jurors in the Daniel Penny trial returned to deliberations for a fourth day Friday an hour before they told the court they would not reach an agreement on the top charge, involuntary manslaughter, as they weighed the end of 26 years. -A Marine veteran and construction student accused of killing a mentally ill homeless man who threatened to kill people on a Manhattan subway.

Around 11:00, the judges sent a letter to the court saying, “We, the judges, are asking for instructions from the Judge. [Maxwell] Wiley. Right now, we can't vote unanimously on court 1 – second degree murder.”

The case requires prosecutors to prove that Penny acted negligently when he arrested Jordan Neely. Neely threw himself on the train while high on drugs, threatening to kill passengers while in a coma, according to trial testimony.

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“In this case, I don't think they can go forward with count 2 unless they find the defendant guilty of count 1,” Wiley told lawyers for both sides, despite protests from prosecutors. “I should at least try to ask the judge to get a verdict on count 1.”

The second charge is a misdemeanor charge of reckless homicide, which carries a maximum penalty of four years in prison.

He then presented new instructions and gave lawyers time to review them.

Neely was a 30-year-old schizophrenic who told the straphangers that someone was “going to die today” and that he didn't care about life in prison. Penny grabbed him from behind to stop him from exploding.

Neely died later. He had an active arrest warrant at the time. He was high on K2, a synthetic drug that acts as a stimulant, and his lengthy criminal record included a 2021 assault on a 67-year-old woman at a subway station.

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Jordan Neely is photographed before going to see the Michael Jackson movie, “This is It,” outside the Regal Cinemas at 8th Avenue and 42nd Street in Times Square, New York, in 2009. (Andrew Savulich/New York Daily News/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

Penny stayed at the scene and spoke to the police. He also agreed to speak with NYPD detectives at the Fifth Precinct building.

“He was saying bad things…but these people were pushing people in front of trains and so on,” he told investigators. There were more than 20 subway shoves in the year before Penny and Neely met.

Just three days earlier, an unidentified person had been stabbed with an ice pick on the J train, according to reports since then. About a month later, a PBS reporter found out the left was struck on the number 4 train. There was a shove a week before that, the victim hit the side of a moving R train and survived.

In that state of fear, the witnesses said they were scared by Neely, who threatened to kill them.

A screenshot from a bystander's video showing Jordan Neely being locked up on the subway in New York City. (Luces de Nueva York/Juan Alberto Vazquez via Storyful)

Witness Ivette Rosario, a 19-year-old student, testified that Neely yelled that someone was “going to die that day.”

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Penny faces a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison if convicted of the most serious crime.