"People always spoke so highly of him," Alexandra Fay, who grew up on the same block as Penny in beachside West Islip, told Manhattan jurors of her one-time neighbor, who is charged with 'recklessly' choking homeless man Jordan Neely to death on a subway train last May. "He was so kind. If anything he was extra kind ... He always spoke up," Fay added, grinning in the direction of Penny, 26, who sat at the defense table in Manhattan Supreme Court.