Police are searching for a group of mask-wearing vandals who allegedly plastered an F train in Brooklyn last week with statements about the Daniel Penny case.
According to law enforcement sources, at least nine suspects were on board a northbound F train at the Neptune Avenue station in Coney Island at around 4:24 a.m. on Dec. 5 when they covered the interior of the train with messages that repeated, “A man was lynched here.”
The statements appeared to reference the ongoing trial of Penny, who is facing trial for the choking death of Jordan Neely, a homeless subway performer, back in May 2023 on board an F train at the Broadway-Lafayette Streets station in NoHo.
Police sources said the messages were a series of stickers wrapped throughout the train’s interior to almost look like traditional ads. A group of adult men and women placed them throughout the train car; most of the vandals, police said, wore hoods, hats and face masks.
Officers from the 60th Precinct and Transit District 34 were alerted to the incident. So far, no arrests have been made.
Despite the nature of the statements, police could not confirm if the vandalism was a protest reaction in response to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s move to drop manslaughter charges against Penny on Friday. The decision came after three days of jury deliberations, during which they deadlocked on the manslaughter charge.
However, a Dec. 6 article on Hyperallergic, a contemporary arts forum, reported that an “autonomous group of activists” boarded the F train that same day at the Broadway-Lafayette Street stop and the Bleecker Street station in SoHo to post the “A man was lynched here” messages.
Jurors in the Penny trial will deliberate again on Monday on a lesser charge of criminally negligent homicide after it deadlocked on a verdict following more than three days of deliberation.
Meanwhile, the investigation regarding the vandalism on the F train remains ongoing.
On Sunday, the NYPD released photos and video of the suspects who remain at large. The video shows the suspects entering the train station through the turnstile.
Anyone with information regarding the incident can call Crime Stoppers at 800-577-TIPS (for Spanish, dial 888-57-PISTA). You can also submit tips online at crimestoppers.nypdonline.org, or on X (formerly Twitter) @NYPDTips. All calls and messages are kept confidential.
