Early Sunday morning, woman set ablaze on a New York City subway car while people and even some police officers looked on as the man who set her on fire fanned the flames. I mean, it's just, incredible. [00:00:17] It's illicited some very strong reactions from people, as you might imagine. I don't even know what to make of it. You know, some stuff seems so overblown. You talk about the subways and are they safe? And this and that. This is horrific. Yeah. [00:00:32] It reminds me of the case we all study when we were younger about Kitty Genovese and, being attacked in the middle of a courtyard and no one doing anything about it. Guys, I get it. You're filming it. Wow. It's going to make amazing video. And it did, but I don't know, go tackle the guy. [00:00:49] More importantly, go try to help her. But that replies more than anyone else to the cops. But but also to the to the bystanders. And so look, there's some implications here. What should be done with this guy given that he's undocumented etcetera. [00:01:05] We'll get into that. But Sharon, more details for us on what actually happened. Yeah, they're just horrific as we said. Here's what we know right now. A man named Sebastian Zapata, Guatemalan national who entered the U.S. Illegally after being deported in 2018, was charged on Monday with first [00:01:24] and second degree murder and arson. The incident began when the victim was approached as she was reportedly sleeping on an F train in Brooklyn early on Sunday morning. Surveillance footage from the train's cameras showed a man walking up to her before setting her clothes on fire. Newsweek with some of these details. [00:01:41] We do want to note the victim has not been publicly identified. According to authorities, they don't believe the two knew each other, nor did they interact before or during the incident. Police said the woman was completely covered in flames within moments [00:01:56] while the man watched from a bench on the platform at the station. Officers patrolling nearby smelled smoke and went in to investigate, finding the woman engulfed in flames. She died at the scene. According to the Assistant District Attorney, Ari Rottenberg, Petta claimed he [00:02:13] didn't know what was happening, saying he was under the influence of alcohol. A lot of discourse, criticism surrounding the police presence and the fact that no one, no one attempted to intervene, help the woman as she burned to death. [00:02:30] Gerald Posner, journalist and author known for his investigations into the JFK assassination, told Newsweek in an interview this I could imagine if you didn't want to be the person who wanted to rush in and try to help them because you're afraid you're going to catch on fire. [00:02:45] You don't know what's going on, I get that. Not everyone's going to be the hero, but here, well, there has to be something better than just being the person recording it, playing out in front of you. And I think it's the last thing I want to do. [00:03:01] But let's take a look at this footage again, because frankly, I think the victim deserves it and we all need to look at it. It's a case study in what's going on with us right now. There he is, fanning the flames. Woman burned to death, sleeping one minute up in flames the next. [00:03:18] Police on the scene, you see a police officer walk right by. And I don't know, because perhaps I've not been in a situation where I've watched someone burn to death. But perhaps it was just so jarring, even by today's standards, that you want [00:03:35] to believe that people couldn't act. But the police officer walking by seemed quite, cognizant of what was going on and kind of had a pep in his step. Not shock to me. What say you? Yeah. If I was the captain of that officer, the first thing I'd ask him is, [00:03:52] did you realize what was on fire? I mean, you should have had a pep in your step no matter what was on fire, but a human being. Jesus Christ man. The number one job of the police is to serve and protect. And so that was incredible, the way that he just walked by, by the way, you know, [00:04:08] they didn't catch the guy there, even though he was right there fanning the flames of the woman he set on fire. They caught him later, a couple of high school kids saw his picture and called it in to 911. So I mean, that is a stunning lack of police policing right there, right there, [00:04:24] right in front of you. And so this is what we complain about in terms of the police, throughout the show, throughout the decades. Unfortunately, yes. It's been that long. Like when they go to do stop and frisk, it goes to 96% blacks and Latinos and. ET cetera. [00:04:40] And they say, well, we got to because it's, you know, we're that we're going to find some sort of danger there. ET cetera. ET cetera. And when it comes to their own safety, they pull the gun and fire within two seconds flat. And we've shown you a number of cases. They've done that. But once a citizen is in trouble, not theoretically on stop and frisk, but [00:04:59] actually on fire, about to die, walk by. It feels like self-preservation to the point of callousness. And and that's so if the police are like, oh, yeah, you really got to back us. ET cetera. Yeah. But brothers and sisters, you also got to back us. [00:05:15] So I know that one video doesn't, you know, capture all the police work in the country, but that was shameful. And so and then in terms of the rest of us as to what we can do, there's not much we can do. The guy, you know, crime overall in New York, [00:05:31] in the subways actually, specifically is down by about 6% year over year. Unfortunately, over the last 4 or 5 years, it went up after Covid, during Covid and after Covid, it's now beginning to come back down a little bit. The number of, murders unfortunately, has gone up from 5 to 9 this year. [00:05:48] But that's a small subset. Really. So the crime is getting a tiny bit better. But we do have to be vigilant about it. And I know some think that we shouldn't do anything about crime in the subways, because it would be bougie to complain. I would hope that they would not think that this was bougie to complain about. [00:06:04] And and then, you know, in terms of this gentleman specifically, gentleman's a funny word to use in this context, but, so he's undocumented, but I don't think that matters because he's very likely going to get a life sentence, and he should. That means we're not going to deport him because he's going to spend [00:06:20] the rest of his life in a New York prison. And then in terms of, like, his mental state, I mean, obviously he's not mentally well. And folks like that need, in my opinion, treatment or if it's not that category, then obviously prison and they shouldn't be walking around and [00:06:37] and we've had too many of these type of folks walking around in my opinion. - Yeah. - Mine too. But, you know, here's what gets me. It's like wild ends of the spectrum. You either have Daniel Penny over here choking someone to death who was unbalanced and screaming things, or no one helping. [00:06:55] And maybe they couldn't, you know, random people. But the other part is the response. Let's talk about more about what authorities said. Police said one officer, the one we saw visible in the footage near the woman, was trying to control the crime scene. Now, I didn't really see that. Okay. [00:07:12] I saw a crime in progress. I think you want to stop it first, but whatever. As other officers tried to get fire extinguishers and summon. Metropolitan Transit Authority employees. Police extinguished the flames with. The woman was pronounced dead at the scene. USA today with that context. [00:07:28] Now, the NYPD Chief of Transit Joseph Gallardo, told reporters this on Sunday. And this is the part that. Who are we? I think you got to question this. I think he did his job perfectly, really know as his fellow officers went [00:07:45] and got MTA workers, got fire extinguishers and eventually were able to extinguish the individual. This is the chief of Trenton, and he had to use that word too perfectly. There's nothing you could have done better here. It's. This is crazy. [00:08:02] I went and spoke to these officers, and I'll say this, they responded. There were numerous officers responding, not just the one officer to this heinous crime. What the officers saw and they had to deal with and they were [00:08:21] trying to get fire extinguishers. I commend that one officer who stayed there that made sure he kept the crime scene the way it's supposed to be made sure he kept an eye on what was going on. This is sick and pathetic, and that's what we all saw, what was going on there. [00:08:39] And it may just be a glimpse. We all saw what was going on there. He's now. He's a hero. You're not just explaining, but now he's a hero. Also took police hours, as Jack mentioned after this woman's death, to apprehend Zepeda. Thank you. To the high school students taken into custody on Sunday, [00:08:56] hours after police disseminated images of a suspect in the woman's death, police said three high schoolers called 911 after recognizing the person in the image. Officers found him on another subway train in the same gray hoodie, wool hat, [00:09:11] paint splattered pants and tan boots. I get it, I've never taken the Oath Badge gun. When I go to work, I don't have that fear of I may not come home to my family, [00:09:26] but can you correct me if I'm wrong? This is the response. Everything was perfect. The officers had to see this. Never mind. That's sadly what you signed up for. I'm not saying they don't have trauma and mental health that goes along with the job that can be disrupted. [00:09:43] But this is incredible. And to be indicative of the way the tables have turned. They're not there to serve and protect. They're there to, I guess, protect their own interests first. Yeah. You know what that reminded me of? And it's a different topic. But I'll tell you what the connection is. [00:09:59] When, after Kamala Harris lost several anchors on TV, said she ran a perfect campaign and. Well, I mean, and her campaign was kind of on fire, too. And so, and and the connection is not that Kamala Harris had anything to do with this story, obviously, it's that the people in power, [00:10:17] even when they do spectacular failures in Orwellian fashion, will tell, you know, we handled it perfectly well. How could you have handled the election perfectly when you lost the election, and all of the swing states and the popular vote, [00:10:32] and in this case, how could you have handled the situation perfectly when the woman died? Like you didn't get to her in time. You didn't extinguish the fire. You didn't even try in the beginning. And then she died. Which part of that is perfect? And. But that's why it's so telling. [00:10:49] And even more damning, because in the analogy with the Democrats, they think, what do you mean? Are the consultant class got like hundreds of millions of dollars in fees and commissions. It's perfect for us, right? Because they don't really care that they lost. [00:11:04] And then in this, in this particular case. So the cops are like, what do you mean none of the cops are harmed? Perfect. It was handled perfectly. We didn't have a scratch on us. I mean, what is this thing about going to get MTA workers and all that nonsense? No. You go. You take your jacket off. Which I saw. [00:11:20] The cop had a jacket and you put it over her. This is not. Hey, I'll come back in 20 minutes after I get that guy and the other guy and get some extra tools is not what you do when someone is on fire. Literally, literally. So it's a terrible excuse. [00:11:36] Horrible job by the cops here. And yes, my friends, there is crime. Violent crime. And look, this is another thing that is involves politics. Unfortunately, because some folks believe that everything is driven, every piece of crime is driven by poverty. [00:11:55] This guy didn't do this because of poverty. He did it because there's something wrong with him. Dylan Roof didn't kill all those black folks in a church because he was poor. There was something wrong with him. Sometimes there's something wrong with folks, and we can't just go. Well, let's take our chances with the civilians and see if they [00:12:12] how many people they kill, right? No, no, we have to have some orderly way of saying, hey, does this person need help in this way, that way or the other way, but just leaving him to go out in the streets and do whatever the hell he wants is not a left wing position. That's an anarchist, libertarian insane position, in my opinion. [00:12:31] Okay, so let's protect the citizens. It's not too much to ask for. No it's not. But that's why too, as a journalist, I've always believed that the storytelling, the messaging is everything. Because the messaging that these authorities came out with afterwards is training us to believe that everything's okay. [00:12:49] Not only were they just stupidly, ridiculously ignorant in their commentary, the authorities after this, they allowed the same guy dressed in the same outfit after this heinous crime, [00:13:06] this murder that people had to witness a woman burning alive to death. And it's some high school kids. It's not like this guy went and changed clothes. He came back to basically the scene of the crime, the subway system, and they just were supposed to accept this. [00:13:23] The messaging to me is everything because it allows people to drink it in. Not really. Let it marinate, just kind of accept it. And then this is how we proceed. Like, yeah, I guess they did a good job. No, they didn't do a good job. This is nothing to do with immigration. [00:13:39] And we're all a word I'm not going to use right now. - I'll give you the last word. - Yeah. Let's get back to sanity. So, cops? Yeah. Cops need to do their job, which is to protect us, not them. [00:13:54] There is crime in the world, and it hurts average Americans more than anyone else. Let's fight for justice for everyone there. I hope it's not too much to ask for. Thanks for watching The Young Turks really appreciate it. Another way to show support is through YouTube memberships. [00:14:11] You'll get to interact with us more. There's live chat emojis, badges. You've got emojis of me Anna John Jr. So those are super fun. But you also get playback of our exclusive member only shows and specials right after they air. [00:14:27] So all of that, all you got to do is click that join button right underneath the video. Thank you.