On any given day in Manhattan’s West Village, you can find America’s most notorious modern-day vigilante walking the streets.
Forty years to the month after Bernie Goetz, now 77, became a ghoulish household name by gunning down four black teenagers in a subway car in 1984, he’s just part of the landscape.
In an exclusive interview, the Daily Mail spoke to Goetz to ask him about the ongoing trial of another so-called ‘subway vigilante’ – 26-year-old Marine veteran, Daniel Penny.
Penny is accused of causing the death of Jordan Neely, 30 – a black, homeless drug addict and occasional Michael Jackson impersonator – by putting him in a chokehold during a brawl on a train in May 2023.
Penny insists he was trying to protect his fellow New Yorkers from a man who seemed dangerous. But city prosecutors say Penny, a white man, went too far.
Closing arguments in Penny’s manslaughter trial began Monday. A jury may start deliberations this week. He faces up to 15 years in prison.
According to Goetz, his and Penny’s cases are similar. ‘It is BS [bulls***] like many things in New York is BS,’ he told the Mail, while standing outside his apartment building – the same one he fled to after the 1984 shooting.
In an exclusive interview, the Mail spoke to Goetz (above) to ask him about the ongoing trial of another so-called ‘subway vigilante’ – 26-year-old Marine veteran, Daniel Penny.
Penny (right) is accused of causing the death of Jordan Neely (center), 30 – a black, homeless drug addict and occasional Michael Jackson impersonator – by putting him in a chokehold during a brawl on a train in May 2023.
‘This is a BS society and it was BS in my time,’ he added.
No doubt, Penny’s defense team would recoil from any comparison to Goetz, a man labeled the ‘Death Wish Killer’ – the title of a popular vigilante–thriller film starring Charles Bronson – by New York City newspapers in the 1980s.
For one, Penny told police that he never intended to kill anyone, while Goetz infamously said that that was exactly what he intended to do.
Lanky and grey-haired, Goetz is now a far cry from the crazed gunman who turned himself in to law enforcement after nine days on the run.
‘For combat you have to be cold-blooded and I was,’ he told three detectives in his videotaped interrogation. ‘I decided to kill them after all, murder them all.’
Today, Goetz is known in the West Village as a harmless eccentric with a gentle hobby: animal rescue.
Neighbors say that, for years, Goetz has been finding injured squirrels and nursing them back to health in his apartment.
The Mail found him frantically searching outside his building for a missing animal, dressed in a rumpled blue polo shirt over black jeans and carrying a white towel that he was planning to use to recapture the critter.
Squirrels, in fact, regularly escape from Goetz’s apartment. Parking garage attendants beneath his building know to be on high alert and contact him to collect his furry friends if they resurface.
During one escape, a source said, Goetz ran into the garage barefoot and panicked. On another occasion, the Mail’s source claims, he found evidence that Goetz was keeping squirrels in his car.
No doubt, Penny’s defense team would recoil from any comparison to Goetz, a man labeled the ‘Death Wish Killer’ by New York City newspapers in the 1980s. (Above) Bernhard Goetz is escorted by police out of criminal court in New York City
The vehicle was allegedly filthy and reeked of animals. Inside the man said he saw a nest and toys that he suspected a squirrel may use.
‘Squirrels can be absolutely wonderful,’ Goetz said. ‘They are more sociable than a dog or a cat and they are highly intelligent.’
That may be true, but Goetz – while seemingly harmless at first glance – is not as pleasant. After tiring from the small talk, he snapped.
‘I think you sound like a reporter. That’s right… Go f***k yourself,’ he told the Mail and walked away.
Indeed, Goetz – a Queens, New York native – spent years in a city much different than today’s. New York in the late 1970s and early 1980s was a cesspool of crime and fear.
Murders hovered around 2,000 a year, according to FBI statistics. Graffiti-covered subway cars were lawless and seen as venues of opportunity for violent thugs.
Goetz claimed to be a victim of crime himself telling investigators before his arrest that he was once mugged and brutally beaten by a group of men. As a result, he said, he started illegally carrying a Smith & Wesson revolver.
That was the reality in the Big Apple on the afternoon of December 22, 1984, when a 37-year-old Goetz – an electrical engineer leaving work – caught a downtown train at 14th Street.
There were 15 to 20 passengers in his subway car, including four black teenagers – Troy Canty, Darryl Cabey, James Ramseur (all 19 years old) and Barry Allen, 18.
Indeed, Goetz – a Queen, New York native – spent years in a city much different than today’s. New York in the late 1970s and early 1980s was a cesspool of crime and fear.
That may be true, but Goetz – while seemingly harmless at first glance – is not as pleasant. After tiring from the small talk, he snapped. ‘I think you sound like a reporter. That’s right… Go f***k yourself,’ he said and walked away.
According to witness testimony and court documents, two of the teens had screwdrivers in their pockets. They later told police that they intended to use the tools to break into arcade machines to steal quarters.
Goetz said he saw one of the teens with his hand in his jacket pocket as if to mimic a gun, but that wasn’t his biggest fear. His biggest concern, he said, was getting beaten up – again.
Goetz took a seat on a long bench across from Canty – and when the train started moving, Canty asked Goetz, ‘How are you doing?’
Goetz allegedly lowered his head and replied ‘Fine.’ Then Canty said, ‘Give me $5.’
At this point, Goetz claimed, he looked into Canty’s face and decided that he had to kill.
‘[Canty] said it with a smile and his eyes were bright,’ Goetz told his interrogators. ‘I knew I had to pull the gun… It was at that point I decided to kill them after all, murder them all, do anything.’
Goetz drew his revolver and – by his own admission – methodically shot one teen after the other, striking Canty, Allen and Ramseur.
Then, he walked over to a cowering but uninjured Darrell Cabey, and said, ‘You seem to be doing all right, here’s another’ and fired.
That shot entered Cabey side and severed his spinal cord, permanently paralyzing him from the waist down and causing irreversible brain damage. The three other teens survived with only minor injuries.
Goetz would later heartlessly tell cops: ‘If I had more bullets, I would have shot them all again and again. My problem was I ran out of bullets.’
Goetz took a seat on a long bench across from Canty – and when the train started moving, Canty asked Goetz, ‘How are you doing?’ (Above) Subway car in which Goetz shot his victims
Many New Yorkers in the 1980s saw Goetz as someone who stood up to the criminals taking over their city. (Above) Guardian Angels support Bernhard Goetz at Rikers Island, New York in January 4, 1985.
He was charged with attempted murder, assault, reckless endangerment and criminal possession of a weapon. But a jury only found him guilty of one count of carrying an unlicensed firearm.
For that Goetz only served eight and a half months of a one-year sentence.
Many New Yorkers in the 1980s saw Goetz as someone who stood up to the criminals taking over their city.
One man stood outside his trial with a sign that read: ‘Bernie Goetz Wins One for the GOOD GUYS!’ Others raised money for his defense and the Guardian Angels, an unarmed civilian street patrol group, demonstrated at his trial.
Even today, in his neighborhood, Goetz has fans.
A barber working near Goetz’s apartment was quick to defend him to the Mail. ‘I hear a lot of good things about him. He’s a normal guy,’ he said. ‘He had a bad experience. What do you expect?’
It’s a benefit of the doubt that this New Yorker also extended to Daniel Penny.
‘I don’t know. I wasn’t there,’ the West Village barber told the Mail. ‘[Neeley] was on drugs. The other guy was a veteran, too.’
‘The government that we have supports people who want to do drugs, don’t want to go to work and just want to do crime,’ he continued. ‘For me and you, who work hard, they don’t want to support us. They just want to put us in jail.’
That, of course, is just one New Yorker’s opinion, but it’ll soon be up to a jury of Penny’s peers to decide whether his case of ‘subway vigilantism’ was justified.
Later, the Mail caught up with Goetz again to ask his reaction to some of his neighbors calling him a ‘hero’.
‘It’s an odd thing,’ he said with a shrug. ‘I am popular in the city. I never intended to be popular. I am and do not know why.’
Then he excused himself and walked into the subway.
