NEW YORK >> A subway commuter who helped an ex-Marine restrain an agitated man aboard a Manhattan subway last year testified Tuesday that he tried to convince the veteran to loosen his grip around the man’s neck.

In a New York City courtroom, Eric Gonzalez recalled encountering the chaotic struggle in progress, after Daniel Penny had already pinned the man, Jordan Neely, to the train’s floor and placed him in a firm chokehold.

“I made my presence known to Daniel Penny,” Gonzalez told jurors. “I said, ‘I’m going to grab his hands so you can let go.’”

Penny is facing manslaughter charges in the May 2023 death of Neely, a 30-year-old man who was homeless. Prosecutors say Penny acted with “indifference” to Neely’s life by keeping him in a chokehold for nearly six minutes.

Penny’s defense attorneys, meanwhile, say their client was seeking to protect himself and fellow riders from a “seething, psychotic” person who had shouted at riders and made distressing statements about wanting to die prior to Penny’s intervention.

But Gonzalez, a casino manager and daily subway rider, hadn’t known any of that when he “jumped in to help,” he revealed Tuesday. Rather, he said he wanted to diffuse the situation by giving Penny an “alternative” to continuing to choke Neely. He recalled telling Penny: “Let him go, get your arm away from his neck.”