A man has been charged with burning a woman to death on a New York subway train, prosecutors said.
Sebastian Zapeta was arrested and charged with murder and arson after the attack on Sunday morning on a stopped F train in Brooklyn’s Coney Island station.
Authorities say he claimed not to know what had happened although he identified himself in photos and surveillance video showing the fire being lit.
The indictment against Zapeta will remain private until he is formally arraigned, as is standard in New York. He remains jailed at the city's Rikers Island complex.
According to prosecutors, Zapeta, 33, who officials said is a Guatemalan citizen who entered the US illegally, approached the woman who may have been sleeping, set her clothing on fire with a lighter and then fanned the flames with a shirt before sitting on platform bench and watching as she burned.
She has yet to be identified.
“This was a malicious deed. A sleeping, vulnerable woman on our subway system," Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez said after a brief court hearing where the indictment was announced.
He said Zapeta has been charged with multiple counts of murder as well as an arson charge.
The top charge carries a maximum sentence of life in prison without parole. The indictment will be unsealed on January 7.
Zapeta was not present at the hearing, and his lawyer declined to comment afterwards.
Mr Gonzalez told reporters that police and medical examiners are working to identify the woman using fingerprints and advanced DNA techniques, while also retracing her steps before the killing.
"Our hearts go out not only to this victim, but we know that there's a family," Mr Gonzalez said.
"Just because someone appears to have been living in the situation of homelessness does not mean that there's not going to be family devastated by the tragic way she lost her life."
A Brooklyn address for Zapeta released by police after his arrest matches a shelter that provides housing and substance abuse support.
US federal immigration officials said he was deported in 2018 but returned to the US illegally some time after that.
Mr Gonzalez argued on Friday that the state charges brought by his office could result in a more severe penalty.
"I have a lot of confidence in the people of Brooklyn and the people who come and serve on jury duty here, and I think that this crime took place in New York City, in Brooklyn, and that the people of this county should serve on the jury there," Mr Gonzalez said.
