The woman who was hideously burned alive in a New York City subway car last week has been identified as a 61-year-old woman from New Jersey, Fox News Digital has learned.

Police told Fox News Digital that the woman was identified as Debrina Kawam of Toms River, a Jersey Shore community and seaside town in Ocean County. Kawam was set on fire and burned to death on December 22 in a subway train in Brooklyn, New York.

Officials were unable to identify Kawam’s body for days after the attack because it was so badly burned. The NYPD did not provide an official cause of death.

Police investigate at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue station in Brooklyn after a woman aboard a subway car was set on fire and died on December 22, 2024 in New York, United States. Police believe the woman had been sleeping on the train when a man approached her and set her on fire. She was pronounced dead at the scene. (Photo by Kyle Mazza/Anadolu via Getty Images)

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The homeless nonprofit Coalition for the Homeless previously said the victim may have been homeless at the time of her death. Police could not confirm whether she was homeless.

Sebastian Zapeta, 33, a previously deported immigrant from Guatemala, was arrested hours after the horrific incident that shocked the nation.

He was charged with one count of first-degree murder, three counts of second-degree murder and one count of arson in connection with the horrific case.

NYPD officers escort Sebastian Zapeta off an F train in Coney Island from a Lower Manhattan precinct on December 22, 2024. (Courtesy: GN Miller/New York Post)

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Surveillance video of the attack showed the suspect walking toward the woman, who was sitting motionless and possibly sleeping, on a stationary F train at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue subway station, then setting her on fire.

Police said Zapeta used a lighter to set fire to the victim’s clothing, which was completely engulfed within seconds.

The suspect then remained at the scene and sat on a bench directly in front of the train car while officers and a transit employee extinguished the flames. The victim was pronounced dead at the scene.

Sebastian Zapeta, accused of setting a woman on fire in a New York City subway, appears in court on December 24, 2024 in New York. (AP Photo/Curtis Means via Pool)

Zapeta faces life in prison without the possibility of parole for first-degree murder, while second-degree murder carries a sentence of 25 years to life in prison, Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez said earlier this week.

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“It was malicious. A sleeping, vulnerable woman in our subway system,” Gonzalez added. “This act surprised many New Yorkers as they prepared to celebrate the holidays, but now New Yorkers are waking up and understanding that this happened on the 22nd of this year. That was intentional and we hope to prove it.”

New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ office tells Fox News Digital that the mayor has directed the NYPD and ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) team to investigate criminal charges against Zapeta under the federal arson law.

Zapeta was arrested by Border Patrol and subsequently deported by the Trump administration on June 7, 2018, after he crossed illegally into Sonoita, Arizona, A week earlier, ICE spokesman Jeff Carter told Fox News. Zapeta later returned illegally to the U.S. at an unknown date and location, Carter said.