Guatemalan migrant arrested for lighting woman on fire in New York subway, watched her burn to death; ghastly act captured on video

NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said the killing happened at about 7:30 am on a train at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue Station.

New Delhi: In a gruesome incident reported from New York’s Brooklyn on Sunday, December 23, a Guatemalan migrant has been arrested for allegedly lighting a sleeping woman on fire in a subway, then watching calmly as the victim burned to death. This incident left the commuters is a state of shock.

New York Police Department Commissioner Jessica Tisch said the killing happened at about 7:30 am on a train at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue Station and described it as “one of the most depraved crimes one person could commit”.

“As the train pulled into the station, the suspect calmly walked up to the victim, who was in a seated position at the end of a subway car and used what we believe to be a lighter to ignite the victim’s clothing, which became fully engulfed in a matter of seconds,” Tisch was quoted by the New York Post during a press conference.

Tisch said that a police patrol unit smelled and saw the smoke and followed it to the flame-covered woman. Although they managed to extinguish the flame, the woman died on the scene.

A horrifying video showed the suspect calmly looking on as the woman was burning to death inside the open subway car door. Cops yelled to the crowd, “Did anybody see anything? Did anybody see anything?”

Even as chaos broke out, the suspect was seen sitting on a nearby bench as police officers huddled up.

“Unbeknownst to the officers who responded, the suspect had stayed on the scene and was seated on a bench on the platform just outside the train car. The body-worn cameras on the responding officers produced a very clear, detailed look at the killer,” said Tisch.

The suspect was reportedly identified as Sebastian Zapeta, a 33-year-old immigrant from Guatemala who arrived in the United States in 2018. He was detained by border patrol agents in Arizona in June that year and his legal status was not immediately clear, sources told the NY Post.

He was caught when three high schoolers told the police that they saw the man pictured in images released by the police at the Jay and York Street Station.

When cops responded to the call, they found the suspect already on another train leaving the station and wearing the same grey hoodie and paint-splattered pants he was wearing when he torched the woman.

Cops halted the train at Herald Square, went from car to car and arrested the suspect. Tisch said he had a lighter in his possession. “I want to thank the young people who called 911 to help. They saw something, and they said something, and they did something,” she said.