The notorious leader of New York’s BLM chapter caused outrage outside the Daniel Penny trial by slurring the former Marine, saying “the KKK got another victory,” after the judge in the case dropped the top charge of manslaughter.
Hawk Newsome, after the jury deadlocked Friday, told reporters anyone who thinks Penny is innocent has “racism in their heart,” and suggested at least one juror in Penny’s case could be a “white supremacist hold out,” according to a report from the Daily Mail.
“Logically, if you pick a white supremacist jury specialist, and you pack a jury with white people, obviously you think race has a specific role in this case, and obviously you are looking for that one white supremacist hold out,” Newsome said according to the report.
The jurors deadlocked both times over the count of manslaughter in the second degree, the top charge in the case.
Newsome said the high-profile subway choking that captured headlines for months is about race.
“Racism has its tentacles all over this case and all over the minds of white America,” Newsome said.
A post by a user on X accusing Newsome of trying to intimidate jurors — who will return next week to deliberate on a lesser charge of criminally negligent homicide — has 14,000 likes.
“Radical BLM activist Hawk Newsome is behind the protests outside the courthouse, trying to intimidate the jurors in the Daniel Penny trial. Why are they allowing this?” wrote user Matthew Nichol.
Newsome is a frequent rabble rouser, who once promised “bloodshed” in response to Mayor Eric Adams’ push for tougher policing.
Penny, 26, was charged with manslaughter after he allegedly put Jordan Neely, 30, — a mentally ill homeless man — in a chokehold during the May 2023 encounter on a Manhattan F train.
Neely had reportedly been harassing and threatening other passengers when Penny put him in the chokehold.
On the second day of deliberations, jurors asked to review the six-minute video shot by another passenger that showed Penny, a former marine, choking Neely.
Prosecutors begrudgingly decided to toss the manslaughter charge after jurors sent two notes — just hours apart — both saying the group was deadlocked on the manslaughter charge.
Justice Maxwell Wiley agreed to drop the charge and ordered the jury to return Monday to deliberate the charge of criminally negligent homicide, which carries a lighter sentence.
Jurors began deliberations in the hotly contested trial Tuesday.