New York police have named the woman who was set on fire and burned to death on a Brooklyn subway train.
Authorities on Tuesday identified Debrina Kawam, 61, of New Jersey as the victim of an apparently random attack on Dec. 22 in which her body was burned beyond recognition.
Sebastian Zapeta, 33, is accused of starting the fire with a lighter while Ms Kawam slept. He allegedly fanned the fire with his shirt and then watched the fire grow from a bench in front of a subway car.
Last week, a grand jury indicted Mr. Zapeta, who claims he does not remember the incident, is charged with 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 press conference at the start of the investigation that authorities were working to collect DNA evidence and fingerprints from Ms. Kawam’s remains.
“The priority for me, for my office and for the police department is to identify this woman so that we can notify her family,” said Mr. González.
False and unverified information about her, including a fake image generated by artificial intelligence, circulated online as authorities worked.
There has also been an outpouring of support, including a vigil held for the then-unidentified victim last week.
Police say Ms. Kawam was motionless, apparently asleep, on a subway train at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue station in Brooklyn early on the morning of Dec. 22 when Mr. Zapeta allegedly approached her with a lighter.
The pair never communicated and police believe they did not know each other.
The video appears to show the suspect waving his shirt at her in an apparent attempt to start the fire, not put it out. Then he gets out of the subway car and watches the flames from the bench on the platform.
Jessica Tisch, New York’s police commissioner, said the smell of smoke drew officers and Metropolitan Transit Authority personnel to the fire, where they extinguished the flames.
“Unbeknownst to the responding officers, the suspect remained 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.
Ms Tisch described the incident as “one of the most depraved crimes that one person can commit against another human being”.
In a preliminary hearing on Tuesday, prosecutor Ari Rottenberg said that Mr. Zapeta told investigators he had been drinking and did not remember the incident, but identified himself in photos and surveillance video of the fire being set.
Mr Zapeta, who is originally from Guatemala, was deported from the US in 2018 and later re-entered the country illegally, immigration authorities said.
He is due back in court on Jan. 7, prosecutors said.
