Police identify woman burned in deadly New York City attack

New York City police have identified the woman who was set on fire and burned alive on a subway train in Brooklyn.

Authorities on Tuesday identified Debrina Kawam, 61, of New Jersey, as the victim of the seemingly random attack on Dec. 22 that burned her body beyond recognition.

Sebastian Zapeta, 33, is accused of starting the fire with a lighter while Kawam was sleeping. He allegedly fanned the flames with a shirt and then watched the fire grow from a bench outside the subway car.

Last week, a grand jury indicted Zapeta, who claims to have no memory of the incident, on four counts of murder and one count of arson.

It took authorities more than a week to fully identify the body.

Eric Gonzalez, the Brooklyn district attorney, said at a news conference early in the investigation that authorities had worked to collect DNA and fingerprint evidence from Kawam’s remains.

“It is a priority for me, my office and the police department to identify this woman, so we can notify her family,” Gonzalez said.

As authorities worked, false and unverified information about her circulated online, including a fake AI-generated image.

There was also an outpouring of support, including a vigil held in memory of the then-unidentified victim last week.

Police say Kawam was motionless, apparently asleep, on a stopped subway train at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue station in Brooklyn early on December 22 when Zapeta allegedly approached her with a lighter.

The pair never interacted and police believe they did not know each other.

The video appears to show the suspect waving a shirt in an apparent effort to fan the flames, rather than put them out. He then gets out of the subway car and watches the fire from a bench on the platform.

New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said the smell of smoke drew police officers and Metropolitan Transit Authority staff to the fire where they extinguished the flames.

“Unbeknownst to the responding officers, the suspect had stayed at the scene and was sitting on a bench on the platform just outside the train car,” Ms. Tisch said.

Authorities pronounced Ms. Kawam dead at the scene.

Tisch described the incident as “one of the most depraved crimes a person could commit against another human being.”

At a preliminary hearing Tuesday, prosecutor Ari Rottenberg said Zapeta told investigators he had been drinking and did not remember the incident, but identified himself in photographs and surveillance videos showing the fire.

Zapeta, originally from Guatemala, was deported from the United States in 2018 and then illegally reentered the country, immigration authorities said.

He is due back in court on Jan. 7, prosecutors said.