The detained man suspected of setting a woman on fire in the New York subway is an illegal migrant from Guatemala

The shocking event took place on Sunday around half past eight in the morning local time on subway line F at the Herald Square station. The man approached the still unknown woman and lit her dress on fire with a lighter, which caught fire in a matter of seconds. The victim died on the spot as a result of the attack.

The New York Post reported that the man entered American territory for the first time in 2018 in the state of Arizona in the southwest of the USA. A few days later he was detained and deported for illegally crossing the border.

He later reached the US again, but it is not clear how long before Sunday’s attack. What is certain according to the letter is that he returned in 2023 at the latest and that he was staying in New York.

In the meantime, a video appeared on the Internet, which shows a burning victim in the open door of one of the wagons. According to the first results of the investigation, the attacker remained near the scene of the crime without anyone suspecting him, and shamelessly observed the burning woman.

Then he fanned her with some piece of clothing, as if he was trying to put it out. “Even the intervening police officers did not know that the suspect remained in place and was sitting on a bench on the platform right across from the wagon,” explained Police Commissioner Jessica Tischová.

The woman was eventually put out by the police, but it was too late. The investigators believe that the perpetrator did not know the woman.

Criminal investigators eventually tracked down the suspect based on their body camera footage. The man in the footage was recognized by three high school students who called the emergency line saying that they had just seen him in another subway train, also on line F.

The police then arrested the alleged perpetrator. He also had a lighter in his pocket, with which he had previously set his victim’s clothes on fire.

Tischová described the incident as “one of the most perverted crimes that a person can commit against another person.”