I'm sure I'm not the only one who was horrified at the horrendous and sheer evil murder of Debrina Kawam in New York on a subway train, just days before Christmas 2024 (22nd of December). At the time Debrina was known as 'The Woman Who Was Burned To Death On The Subway' and it was utterly heartbreaking, unbelievable and it took investigators some time to identify her badly burned remains. It was a horrible situation like something out of the worst horror movie.
Like a lot of shocked members of the public, I watched the news reports and read the newspaper articles and I couldn't believe the details that were emerging. Debrina, who had fallen on some hard times, was simply on a New York Subway train, she had been homeless after experiencing a difficult period of her life and was on the train around 7:25 am and had fallen asleep. She was just a 57 year old woman, who was homeless, minding her own business and had her belongings beside her.
As Debrina was asleep, a 33 year old man named Sebastian Zapeta-Calil just randomly walked past her and set fire to her clothing before casually walking off of the train, sitting down on the platform and watching Debrina as she literally (and I'm sorry to say this but this is the facts of the case) burned alive. The monster just sat there. Witnesses said that he did try to 'fan the flames' at one point but his heartless demeanour was there for all to see and captured on CCTV cameras.
Who could do such an evil thing and why? Debrina and Sebastian were not known to each other, they never even spoke to each other, and even if he did know her or an argument had taken place etc, this horrific and cruel murder should never have happened.
I never knew Debrina personally but my heart broke for her and when I see her yearbook picture, it still does. The picture I have included of Debrina was her yearbook photograph from high school and when I first saw her picture, I couldn't believe how beautiful she was, like a movie star or a model. This beautiful girl in 1985 with the amazing smile and her whole life ahead of her was so full of promise and the possibilities were endless. She was very talented and popular, former school friends remember her as having time for everyone and always loved a good laugh and a party. She was quoted in the yearbook as saying that her secret ambition was to ''Party Forever''.
Debrina was involved in a lot of social activities and events in high school, she was known for her ''million dollar smile'' and participation in cheerleading. She was very intelligent and went on to university to study business and marketing but somewhere along the line things just fell off. In the early 1990s, Debrina had been caught working as a sex worker to make ends meet after she fell into a huge amount of debt. She loved her family but from what is known there wasn't a very close relationship with them and a lot of Debrina's circumstances from that time are difficult to track. All we know is that she continued to face a lot difficulties during the 1990's and that continued right up until her heartbreaking death.
There had been relationships in the past and moments where it looked like she had turned a corner but sadly they didn't last and she fell back on difficult times and an addiction to alcohol would take over. More heartache was to follow when her father passed away. Debrina adored her father but they didn't always communicate and when he passed away she had written online how she loved her father and didn't realise how lucky she had been to have had him in her life until it was too late. Her relationship with her mother wasn't very close but she would still turn to her for help. Not long before Debrina's death, her mother had moved away and for some unknown reason, failed to tell Debrina that she was moving. A neighbour of her mother's recalled later that she used to see both Debrina and her mother out and about from time to time and the relationship between the pair appeared to be quite strained. The neighbour also said that she thought Debrina appeared to have some sort of disability and needed the aid of a walker.
Debrina had only recently shown up on her mother's doorstep only to find that another woman answered the door and told her that her mother no longer lived at that address, Debrina appeared to be shocked. When the lady offered to take a note of Debrina's phone number just incase her mother did show up again, Debrina simply replied that she didn't own a phone and she just left.
There is some record of Debrina staying at a homeless shelter in the city for a short period of time before sleeping rough in the Subway. It seems that Debrina had been up and down with difficulties in the 1990s but when her father passed away things took even more of a nosedive and she ended up spending a lot of time homeless. She was a very vulnerable person and many people mentioned they were used to seeing her around the subway. Obviously when she was younger, these difficulties didn't appear to be there but as she got older she had a lot of physical as well as psychological struggles and one wonders if this was due to her addictions and life on the streets. Whatever the case is, it is just truly heartbreaking and her story has really touched me and I just felt that I wanted to share her story, a bit more of her background. I don't feel that it's right that a lot of people just know her for the horrific way that she was murdered.
Looking again at Debrina's yearbook picture, you see so much light in her glowing smile and positivity of what the future was to hold and then you think of the difficult years that she ended up struggling through and her horrific death.
Her heartless killer was an illegal immigrant who claims to have been drunk or that he couldn't remember carrying out the evil crime. His face is just soulless, not a shred of remorse or emotion. He's pleaded not guilty despite witnesses and CCTV footage showing every step and action he took.
Opinions on this case have been divided and some people are uncaring due to the fact that Debrina was homeless and had been in trouble with the law and alcoholism in the past but that should not matter, nobody has the right to walk up to a complete stranger on a public mode of transport and take their lives, whether it be with setting someone on fire, a gun or a knife, nobody has the right to do that.
As I have been writing this post, arguments are continuing to take place on X about various countries facing a lot of serious problems due to illegal immigration. As we begin 2025, we have already begun to see divides and heated discussions on various issues, one wonders if a compromise or peace can ever be found but one thing is for sure, we have to look out for each other and I just wish that more people could have stepped in to help Debrina. There's rumours that people were stood around filming the whole horrific scene that terrible morning, instead of jumping in and helping. We are living in a world where that is becoming more and more commonplace, people picking up their phones to record crimes but not getting involved. In many ways that is understandable, cause you could put your own life at risk but if you see someone in sheer pain or on fire, at least try something, not just stand there and film it and quite frankly, why would you record that? Anyway, that is just my thoughts on the situation. I would love to read/hear yours.
Sebastian Zapeta-Calil will be back in court at the end of March and faces life imprisonment. At his recent court appearance in Brooklyn, New York, he needed an interpreter because he could barely speak a word of English (or he pretended not to be able to speak English) and claims to be not guilty. I will update this post if any more news comes up.
One wonders what it must be like also for Debrina's former high school friends as I can probably imagine with how hectic Debrina's life was, she probably lost contact with a lot of her school friends. I'm sure we've all had those friends or people we knew in high school and wondered whatever became of them, imagine turning on the news to see this type of horrifying story, it must be a terrible shock for them.
Debrina's nickname at school was 'Deb' or 'Debbie' and as heartbreaking as this case is, I do hope that her school friends remember her how she was back then, full of fun and excitement for the future and not what happened later because there was so much more to the beautiful and intelligent person who just somehow lost their way in life and ended up having her life taken in the most evil way.
I wish I had a magic wand, not just in this case but in all the cases I've covered. I wish we could go back so that Debrina would be in a better place and not on that train on the 22nd of December but that is just wishful thinking.
RIP Debrina, you will never be forgotten and to many, many strangers like me, you are not just the woman who was murdered on the subway, you are so much more and will be remembered for the light that you did bring into the world in the good times and your glowing smile. I hope you are at peace.
Further Reading & Sources:
- Subway Murder Case: Article | CBS News
- Subway Murder Case: Article | Times of India
- Subway Murder Case: Article | The New York Times
- Subway Murder Case: Article | CBS News
- Subway Murder Case: Article | The Free Press
- Debrina Kawam: Article | BBC News
- Debrina Kawam: Reddit Discussion Thread
- Debrina Kawam: Article | NBC News
- New York City Subway | Wikipedia
As always if you have made it to the end of this post, I appreciate your time in reading it and I always welcome everyone's thoughts and opinions, you may have known Debrina personally or just want to share your views, whatever you would like to say, please do so below in the comments section or email me in confidence (I never share anyone's messages or emails) at jocaledoniankitty@gmail.com
I hope you will join me in my next post, please take care of yourselves x
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