Here is my ‘hot take’ on the Daniel Penny case, which ended this morning with a Not Guilty Verdict on the lesser charge of Criminally Negligent Homicide, after the jury hung on Friday on Second Degree Manslaughter and the judge dismissed the case rather than declare a mistrial.
I make mention of Phil Ochs’ song, There But For Fortune, which you can listen to at the bottom of this post.
Transcript auto-generated, may contain transcription errors; lightly edited for transcrip clarity.
There was a not-guilty verdict in the Daniel Penny case this morning on the criminally negligent homicide charge, which is the lesser of the charges. On Friday, there was a hung jury in the second-degree manslaughter charge, and the judge dismissed the charge in a very questionable legal move, which might potentially leave this open to retrial. That’s something that would be disputed.My overwhelming reaction to it, obviously, was joy. Good for him—he should never have been put on trial.This was another travesty of justice, a prosecutorial travesty of justice in New York City, just like the multiple trials and indictments of Trump. Highly politicized prosecutions from an office that never would have brought these charges in all likelihood had it not been for pressure from activists.This is a victory for him, obviously, but look at what he had to go through. My big takeaway here reminds me of the Phil Ochs song, which was actually written for him by Joan Baez and one I listen to all the time: There but for Fortune could go you or I.That’s really what this case is about. It wasn’t really about Daniel Penny, it wasn’t really about the trial, and it wasn’t really about the verdicts. It’s about the fact that we live in an era where prosecutors—Democrats, Soros-backed prosecutors—are so highly politicized that we’re all at risk.There but for Fortune could have gone you or I if we were in that subway car. No good choices—you either defend yourself and other people, or you get subjected to the mercy of somebody threatening you. A person who came across clearly as psychotic and threatening. No good choices. There but for Fortune could go you or I.What stands between that outlook and what we should have is a prosecutor who exercises sound discretion, who’s not politicized, who doesn’t give in to the howling mob. The mob outside the courthouse today was creating such a ruckus that the defense raised an objection to the trial continuing, to the deliberations continuing.This is George Soros. I’ve said this before at the website: his evil genius is being able to find the weaknesses in a society. Whether it was the currency speculation where he made his billions tanking the British pound, or the way he has funded various non-governmental organizations to do his work, but particularly the way he funded prosecutors.He found that there’s a weakness in our society. Prosecutors have almost unfettered power. They have close to absolute, if not absolute, immunity from civil suit for what they do as prosecutors.But they are subject to the criminal laws, and I hope that our new incoming Department of Justice will examine these various Soros prosecutors, will examine whether there are any legitimate ways to prosecute them if the laws were broken.Certainly, Alvin Bragg came up with very innovative, very questionable legal ways of resurrecting claims against Donald Trump. I think it’s up to the incoming Department of Justice to look at these Soros prosecutors and decide whether they are subject to the sort of legal theories they have used against others.We have to stop this system where, for political reasons, we are all at risk. There but for Fortune could go we.
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