I was in Penny's exact situation in NYC one afternoon in the early eighties. A man and a woman were walking ahead of me and this big brawny guy was ranting at her and he looked very dangerous. It was not clear whether or not they knew each other. I was trailing along half a block behind them when she suddenly bolted across Sixth Ave with him chasing her. He had grabbed her around the neck and had her pinned against a van with her feet off the ground while I ran across a few seconds behind them. With a running start I kicked him as hard as I could in the kidneys. If someone did that to me, I'd be on the ground sobbing like a baby, but he didn't even respond. It was like I wasn't even there. He was literally killing this woman with me trying to figure out what to do next. I'm no kind of fighter, but fortunately, I'd seen the infamous choke-hold explained on TV because the cops using it and it was already controversial back then. So I tried it out and very fortunately for all of us, he dropped like a bag of sand. It was amazing. Just in time another guy ran up and together we sat on him. Eventually we let him up and he toddled off smiling like nothing had happened, completely unfazed by the whole thing. What people don't get is that in real life, unless you're superman, you won't have the choice of escalating force gracefully. And it's scary as hell. Without the choke hold, that guy clearly could have swatted me like a fly--my best shot had already failed to even register on him. So what does a guy in Penny's situation do? Nothing? Tap him on the shoulder first? Try to pin him by the shoulders and hope you are stronger than a psychotic grown male? (You are not.) I'm sorry the guy Penny tried to subdue died, and I'm sure Penny is too, but what exactly do people think he should have done? If I'm ever stuck in a subway car with an aggressive psychotic grown man I hope there's a guy like Penny around!