I have an article today on the Jordan Neely case who, if you’re not aware, is the latest candidate being auditioned to fill George Floyd’s spot in the national race riot reckoning slot. The media emphasizes that Neely was a Michael Jackson impersonator, they tend to bury the lede on his long history of violence.
The media is full of pictures of Jordan Neely performing as a Michael Jackson impersonator.
None show him punching a 67-year-old woman in the face as she was leaving a subway station. The vicious thug broke her nose, fractured her orbital bone, and fell leading to “substantial pain to the back of her head.”
That’s the felony assault case that Neely was still wanted on a year and a half later when he began terrorizing passengers on a subway train in downtown Manhattan.
The videos of him moonwalking in the subway don’t show the time he was arrested for attempted kidnapping after he was seen dragging a 7-year-old girl down the street.
He got off with only 4 months in jail.
They also don’t show any of his over 40 other arrests or the time he threatened to kill his grandfather.
A neighbor told reporters, “They wouldn’t let him inside sometimes at night because they were afraid of him.”
More details are slowly coming out about Neely’s history. New York City’s social services and judicial system were well aware that he was dangerous.
Mr. Neely was on what outreach workers refer to as the “Top 50” list — a roster maintained by the city of the homeless people living on the street whom officials consider most urgently in need of assistance and treatment. He was taken to hospitals numerous times, both voluntarily and involuntarily, said the employee, who spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss his history.
Mr. Neely racked up more than three dozen arrests. Many were of the sort that people living on the street often accrue while homeless, like turnstile-jumping or trespassing. But at least four were on charges of punching people, two of them in the subway system.
At least four. There appeared to be many more times when Neely threatened to kill people from his grandfather to a booth agent.
Outreach workers noted that Mr. Neely heavily used K2, the powerful, unpredictable synthetic marijuana. In June 2019, an outreach worker noticed that Mr. Neely had lost considerable weight and was sleeping upright. Around that time, he was reported to have banged on a booth agent’s door and threatened to kill her, according to the worker’s notes. Then he was gone.
But it was the authorities who kept him on the loose after that attack.
In November 2021, Mr. Neely’s aggression seemed to peak, when he punched a 67-year-old woman in the street on the Lower East Side, the police said. The woman suffered severe facial injuries, including a broken nose, according to court documents. He was charged with assault and, awaiting the resolution of his case, spent 15 months in jail, the police said, though his family said the stint was shorter.
He pleaded guilty on Feb. 9 of this year, in a carefully planned strategy between the city and his lawyers to allow him to get treatment and stay out of prison.
Those “carefully planned strategies” are at the heart of the pro-crime movement devastating major cities. Diversion programs, felony assaults that become misdemeanors, second and third chances stretching on indefinitely until someone dies. And that’s the real backstory of Jordan Neely. Had the system done its job and locked him up, he would likely still be alive.
But New York Democrats, from the state leadership beginning with Gov. Hochul and the monstrous Senate majority leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and House Speaker Carl Heastie are in love with criminals and keep crying about someone who once died in custody on Riker’s Island because he wasn’t immediately released.
Now it’s not just innocent victims who are dying because of their pro-crime policies, but even the monsters they’re trying to protect.
In New York City, apart from Mayor Eric Adams, every legislative leader and local elected official, including Speaker Adrienne Adams, are just as bent on releasing monsters to roam the streets and subways.
Jordan Neeley viciously assaulted a 67-year-old woman. The system conspired to keep him on the street. And then did nothing meaningful to lock him up.
But just 13 days later, he abandoned the facility. Judge Biben issued a warrant for his arrest.
In March, an outreach worker saw him in the subway, neatly dressed, calm and subdued, and got him a ride to a shelter in the Bronx. (The outreach workers typically do not check for arrest warrants when interacting with homeless people.) But a downward spiral followed.
Why don’t they check arrest warrants? They’re funded by the public taxes. Ah, but the politicians will explain to us that the homeless won’t “trust” them if they actually check to see if the crazy they’re interacting with may have just butchered four people.
On April 8, when outreach workers approached him in a subway car at the end of the line in Coney Island, Mr. Neely urinated in front of them. When an outreach worker went to call the police, according to a worker’s notes, Mr. Neely shouted, “Just wait until they get here, I got something for you, just wait and see.”
Just asking for food, right? That’s the story the Squad and the media have been going with until now.
Officers arrived and ejected Mr. Neely from the train, apparently unaware of the arrest warrant.
Of course they weren’t. The system is worthless and broken.
The following week, an outreach worker saw him in Coney Island and noted that he was aggressive and incoherent. “He could be a harm to others or himself if left untreated,” the worker wrote.
Daniel Penny, the ex-Marine who restrained him, along with a few other men, reached the same conclusion, independently, as everyone else who had come into contact with Jordan Neeley. Including his own grandparents.
It wasn’t a hard conclusion to reach. The system didn’t fail Jordan Neeley. It failed the people it was supposed to protect from him. It set him loose and what happened was the best possible outcome in that he is no longer capable of hurting anyone ever again. Had the system done its job, it would have locked him up. Instead, this monster who assaulted everyone in sight was allowed to keep roaming until someone stood up to him.
But sure, let’s run some more Michael Jackson impersonator videos from years ago. Surely no one who dresses like Michael Jackson could be a predator.