Daniel Penny is walked out of the New York Police Department fifth Precinct on May 12 after he surrendered to authorities after being charged with second diploma manslaughter within the chokehold loss of life of Jordan Neely.

Timothy A. Clary/AFP through Getty Images

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Timothy A. Clary/AFP through Getty Images

Daniel Penny is walked out of the New York Police Department fifth Precinct on May 12 after he surrendered to authorities after being charged with second diploma manslaughter within the chokehold loss of life of Jordan Neely.

Timothy A. Clary/AFP through Getty Images

In his first interview since inserting Jordan Neely in a deadly chokehold, former U.S. Marine Daniel Penny insisted that the confrontation between the 2 “had nothing to do with race,” and he was “not a white supremacist.”

“Everybody who’s ever met me can tell you, I love all people, I love all cultures,” Penny advised the New York Post. “I was actually planning a road trip through Africa before this happened.”

Penny, 24, who’s white, faces a felony charge of second-degree manslaughter for the loss of life of Neely, a 30-year-old Black man who was homeless. The cost carries a most sentence of 15 years in jail. His subsequent courtroom date is July 17.

The altercation passed off on May 1 on a New York City subway practice. Neely, who used to perform on subway platforms as a Michael Jackson impersonator, was shouting that he was hungry and thirsty and moments later, Penny put Neely in a chokehold for a number of minutes. Neely was pronounced useless that very same day.

“I can tell you that the threats, the menacing, the terror that Jordan Neely introduced to that train has already been well documented,” Penny advised the Post.

Penny added that Neely’s loss of life was tragic and the true blame needs to be on “the system.”

“It’s tragic what happened to him. Hopefully, we can change the system that’s so desperately failed us,” he stated.

Penny went on to say that he felt no disgrace. When requested if he would do it once more, he nodded and stated, “I would — if there was a threat and danger in the present.”

Penny was arrested greater than every week after the incident and after protests calling for him to be charged. Activists drew comparisons between Neely’s loss of life, proven in a viral video, and the deaths of Eric Garner and George Floyd, who died by the hands of white cops.

But Penny repeatedly advised the New York Post that race had nothing to do with the confrontation between him and Neely.

“I judge a person based on their character. I’m not a white supremacist,” he stated.

Neely’s funeral service passed off on Friday at Harlem’s Mount Neboh Baptist Church. The Rev. Al Sharpton, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and New York Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado had been amongst those that attended.