New York Magazine’s first cover feature for 2024 is a story by features writer Lisa Miller on the tragic life and death of Jordan Neely, who was killed by a fellow passenger on the subway, illuminating how an ineffective web of social services fails those living on the margins. Miller details his short life — from his devastating childhood and the events that precipitated his mental illness, substance abuse, and erratic behavior to his passions, talents, and the friends and systems that couldn’t keep him out of harm’s way.
“The death of Jordan Neely on the F train last May initially felt like one of those pivotal New York moments when something might finally change for the people struggling with homelessness who are part of all of our lives,” says Miller. “Then Jordan Neely’s name was almost immediately forgotten, and the problem of homelessness just seemed to go on and on, unsolvable, unfixable, unwatchable. We talk so easily about ‘structural failure’ and ‘falling through the cracks,’ but reporting this story gave me a clear picture of what that looks like in real life.”
The cover features a photograph of Neely, taken by Freddie L. Rankin II, from the summer of 2012 during Neely’s transfer between Times Square and Port Authority.
Elsewhere in the issue, Tom Scocca writes on how illness upended his life, and Erika Hayasaki tells the story of how a pair of high-school sweethearts helped each other survive Maui’s deadliest fire.