Crime Weekly - S3 Ep262: Crime Weekly News: Woman Set On Fire in NYC Subway

Episode Date: January 1, 2025

On December 22, 2024, 57-year-old Debrina Kawam was set on fire while sleeping on a train at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue station in Brooklyn, New York. The suspect, 33-year-old Sebastian Zapeta-Calil, approached Kawam and ignited her clothing with a lighter. Despite efforts to extinguish the flames, Kawam succumbed to her injuries shortly after the attack. Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod

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Price and participation may vary. Cannot be combined with any other offer. Single item at regular price. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to Crime Weekly News. I'm Derek Levasseur. And I'm Stephanie Harlow. Happy holidays to everyone. We hope you had an amazing Christmas if you guys celebrate. And as you're watching this or listening to it, it's New Year's Day. No, New Year's Eve.

Yeah. Well, it's New Year's Day for them. New Year's Eve for us. Oh, true. Yeah. But for you, it's New Year's Day. Happy New Year's Eve for us. Oh, true. Yeah. But for you, it's New Year's Day. Happy New Year's. Happy New Year. We hope you had a good time. Do you have any special plans for tonight, Stephanie? No. My special plans are take a shower, wash my hair and get in bed early. I'm not a big New Year's person either. I'm beat. The Christmas and everything really just took me out. I just celebrated my daughter Tenley's birthday. She turned 12.

Happy birthday, Tenley. I know. She looks like a little lady on the pictures you posted. Don't remind me. She looks so grown up. I can't stand it. Oh my God. It's bad.

She looks just like you. Yeah, I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but yes, she does. It's bittersweet. My last year before her teens, and you've already experienced it with Nev, so you know how it goes. And with Aiden. Oh yeah, Aiden too. That's right. That's right. Damn. And you've already experienced it with Nev, so you know how it goes. And with Aiden. Oh, yeah.

Aiden, too. That's right. That's right. Damn. And I got to tell you, little boys, once they become teenagers, they're easy up till then. People are always like, oh, girls, once they become teenagers. I find that the little boys are far more. Difficult.

Is that a nice way to say it? Sensitive. Yeah, challenging. He's challenging. I'm waiting for it because all my buddies are like, just wait, man, just wait. All of a sudden, one day it just hits. And I'm like dreading that day. I just hope that I have the exception to the rule. I probably don't. I never did with Nev, so you might. I really do. I really do hope. Okay. Well, we hope everyone had a good holiday out there as well. And we hope you guys were all safe and made the right choices,

and you're here listening or watching under good circumstances, not from a jail cell. So that's the goal. Jeez. Well, damn. It was zero to 100, man. So we're going to switch gears really quick because this is something that happened before Christmas,

but it's been making its rounds through the media, and it's bringing up a lot of interesting conversations. But for anybody who doesn't know, on December 22nd, 57-year-old Dabrina Kawam was asleep on the Eidol F train at the Stilwell Avenue station in Brooklyn, New York, when just before 7.30 a.m., she was set on fire by a man who we're going to talk about tonight. They've identified him. They just did, yeah. There's a lot of conversations around him. But just seeing the video, I saw it obviously everywhere. And it's just a really disturbing video to see. And a lot of people are dissecting it.

What does it mean? The fact that there's this one visual, which I truly don't understand, where you can kind of see Dabrina in the background on fire. And there's like a Amtrak slash police officer. I don't know if it's an NYPD guy, but they're just kind of looking at the camera and not doing anything to put her out, which he actually looks annoyed. Yeah.

He looks disturbed. And I don't get that. He looks annoyed. He doesn't look disturbed. He looks like Jesus, another thing. That's what he looks like. I was like, this can't. And I mean, at first, my first initial response was to be like, this asshole, right? But then I live in New York. I go to New York City. Well, I used to go to New York City a lot. In the past few years, I do not because the crime there is so exponentially out of control that it's just, it's not worth it anymore. That city that I once loved very much has been

completely destroyed by crime. And I almost wonder if his reaction, because it's not like he wasn't, I mean, what was he going to do to put her out at that point? He could do something. He could do something. I agree. But maybe he was like, now I got to call this in. You know, it's another thing. Like, I don't know, man. I'm trying to give people the benefit of the doubt because I cannot imagine walking by somebody who was on fire, looking annoyed in that way, and then just walking on and doing nothing.

I can't imagine that that's what happened. And I'm trying to give people the benefit of the doubt because I need to regain or retain both, actually regain and retain some faith in humanity at this point. To your point. And again, we'd have to hear from him. The optics of it is terrible. There's no way around it. Just the perspective of it.

There's three police officers that walked by her. It was how many? Three. Three. It just optically it looks terrible. There could be an argument where at that point they know she's gone. You could tell she's gone and she's not standing there. She's kind of, she's already gone. She's already gone. And maybe they're not wanting to,

you know, contaminate the crime scene. I mean, that would be an argument. But for me personally, as a human being, if I'm the police officer there, I'm taking off my jacket, I'm throwing it over her, I'm doing something, or I'm going to find a fire extinguisher. I'm putting her out. I mean, if it contaminates the scene, it contaminates the scene, but you got to, there's a, like you said, a human element to it where I'm not just going to stand by. And if I was a civilian taking that video or that photo, and I seen that I would have dropped my camera and put her out as well. So there's different things that could have been done. I don't like the optics of it. Obviously, this isn't why we're here today, not to just talk about this,

this one visual. We're here to talk about the crime and how crazy this all is that this could happen in 2024. But here we are, here we are. And like I said, it's bringing up a lot of interesting conversations as there's people on both sides of the political aisle, making, making it a political issue, which I'll, I'll save that for you as far as you're getting into the details, but we'll discuss it overall. It's a horrible situation. Oh, you'll say, you'll save the controversial stuff for me. Thanks. I mean, you're covering it. I mean, listen, it's not us saying it. I mean, listen, it's a very public thing.

If you go on X, you go on social media, any platform, TikTok, you're seeing different people taking this and using it to support their position. Not only politicians. I don't care about that. I don't even. To be honest with you, neither do I. Because people who are that extreme on one side or the other are going to cling to any story that somehow supports their narrative one way or the other. I don't care about any of that stuff because people who are that extreme on one side or the other are going to cling to any story that somehow supports their narrative. I don't care about that. Completely agree.

If you're a person with two brain cells to rub together and make a spark, whether or not you fall on one side or the other, you can admit that New York City is out of control with crime and it's been steadily getting worse. And we're going to discuss it shortly tonight. But just even the subway, I won't ride the subway anymore. And I're going to discuss it shortly tonight, but just even the subway. I won't ride the subway anymore. And I used to not feel completely safe. I never feel completely safe anywhere. But at least I knew if I kept my wits about me and was looking around. There's always strange things happening in New York, especially in the subway tunnels and on the subway. It's kind of part of its charm. It is no longer charming. When people are being set on fire for, at this point, no reason whatsoever, and there's never a good reason

to set somebody on fire, but it appears when you're watching the video, these people did not know each other, right? This woman was sleeping. She's got like a blanket on her. She's got a lot of clothes around her. And he's just looking at her, and then he walks up and casually sets her ablaze, and then walks off the train, walks across, because the train's idle, so it's just sitting there with the doors open, walks across to a bench, sits on the bench, and calmly watches her burn. Sick, you know what, yeah. Yeah.

Was she homeless? They haven't really said it, but they did say she had a lot of, she had a blanket on her. She had a lot of clothing around her. She was trying to stay warm. Yeah. She was sleeping. And you see this a lot, right? With the homeless population, the assaults that happen on the homeless population because they're an easy target. They're out there. They're susceptible to this type of stuff. I see. I've, I've seen a lot of, of homeless, the homeless population assault other people. I've seen a lot of the homeless population assault other people. I've seen a lot of random people assault the homeless population. It's not a good scene, no matter what

way you look at it. Happens everywhere too, not just New York, but that is something that even out here you see it. Not everywhere. Well, not everywhere, but I will say it's not just specific to New York where you have homeless people being injured. In fact, we were talking before we recorded about another incident that just recently happened in North Carolina where someone was set on fire again. Yeah, the same month, December, yeah. And this also isn't about bashing New York. I will, to your point, I'm not from New York,

but I was filming for a while there when I was filming Crime Feed every single week. And I'm someone who has been around this shit for a long time in my profession. And even as a six foot, you know, bigger person. Hey, you're six foot four. I don't. I'm six one, six one.

But that said, I definitely am watching my back in there. And New York is one of the few states where I don't carry my firearm because the laws are so specific there. And now it's in Rhode Island as well, not to dive into the weeds, but their capacity for their magazines, not all my magazines were legal in New York. And from what I had been told from colleagues, even if you're a former law enforcement, if you are not abiding by their carry laws,

even though there's like a federal law, which is the Leosa law, you could still be arrested for it. So I just never wanted to risk it. And so I wouldn't carry in New York. And I always felt a little vulnerable when I was walking the streets or taking the train to get to one place to another. And when I'd have my family come visit, I was very strict about the fact that I didn't want them taking the train. I wanted them using Uber. A hundred percent, which it's very expensive, right? That can get expensive. Yeah. But so yes, it's tough. It's tough out there in New York City right now. It's a very populated city. There's a lot of crime going on and probably not enough police officers. That's bad. And I'm from New York, so I will talk shit all day. That city

used to be my favorite city in the world and And it was magical. And it's just, I don't even recognize it anymore. And yeah, there are not enough police officers because there was a huge push in the past years to defund police officers and police stations all over. Look what's happening in LA. They defunded the police. They took funding away from the police. They also changed laws to make certain shoplifting under certain amounts not a felony anymore. They just changed back. I don't know if you saw that now – because it used to be if you shoplifted and you stole something under $950, it would not be a felony. And then at that point, police officers weren't even arresting most people. They were just standing there and watched them loot these stores because it was like, what's going to happen? I'm going to arrest them. They're going to get a misdemeanor. If that slap on the wrist be released, they're going to do it again. Now they've changed it back to a felony because it's gotten so bad that stores are shutting down all over Los Angeles, like chains of stores, Whole Foods and things like that,

because it's just not worth it for them to stay open anymore. And it's ludicrous. So I think that it's time for cities like New York to kind of follow suit on that now. I mean, if L.A. can do it, New York certainly can and should. Agreed. One more thing about cops, just not only not enough, but I'll also say, and this may be an example of it, we have to raise the qualifications and the standards that we're using for hiring police officers. It's abysmal at this point. And it's just not a New York issue. I'm seeing it all over the country right here in my home state of Rhode Island. Some of these people that have badges, Stephanie, it's scary.

I mean, and Michael Proctor. So I mean, Mass State Police is very hard to get onto, which is even scarier. But just local law enforcement, what I'm seeing out there, not saying I was the best, but man, it used to be difficult to become a cop. And what I'm seeing now, not only what I'm seeing, but also from what I'm hearing from colleagues that are in it right now, the qualifications because the lack of people applying for it. Lack of candidates because it's become an incredibly dangerous job. It used to be like you needed a college degree and you couldn't have any criminal record. And now it's like, well, if you haven't had a misdemeanor in the last three years,

you could still apply. It's like, listen, if you shoplifted before and, or you stole something or you sold drugs, how can you in good conscience go out there and arrest someone for the same crime? Even if you've already did your part. I mean, some may argue like you should be, the people should be allowed to, you know, make right of their wrongs, but we're expecting the best of the best in law enforcement. And I don't want criminals now becoming cops because if they're willing to bend their ethics before, they're capable of doing it again. And those are the same people that are responsible for taking away your freedoms. So that's a scary thing to me. These are supposed to be top-notch human beings. And as we have seen over the years, that's not the case. Yeah. Corruption and bad

apples have always existed in law enforcement since the dawn of time. You know, it's fine. And we know that there for a long time, those police officers who would protect criminal organizations in return for, you know, bribes and things like that. We know. But it just seems so widespread and rampant now that it's almost like staggering. It's like, what are we doing here? What are we doing? And I'm not even talking to that level. I'm talking just like the level of complacency. Just like you're not that smart and you're not that good at your job. And like this dude's walking by and like, oh, another person on fire. Like I got to deal with this today. It's Christmas time. Yeah. They don't want to deal. Yeah. They don't want to deal.

Yeah. They just, they don't, they're there to collect the paycheck. And I don't know what this guy was doing. Like I said, there might be an explanation for it. I don't know what that would be, but just in general. Um, and I hate that. That's what this episode became, but we both kind of just went on the tangent, but no, overall not liking what I'm seeing as a former law enforcement officer.

We need change. And I do feel like the pendulum is swinging a little bit, but we need a lot. It's got to go a lot more. It's got to go a lot more. We got to raise the standards, folks. So let's give you the facts of the case before we get too far off straight. Unfortunately. On Monday, December 23rd. So this was the day after the incident.

33-year-old Sebastian Zapata Khalil was charged with first and second degree murder and first degree arson. Now, surveillance video of the horrific incident, like I said, it shows Zapata Khalil sitting on a bench and watching his victim burn as police officers responded. The NYPD has said that investigators on the scene initially thought the fire had been set by accident because they noticed that the victim had liquor bottles around her. I don't know why it matters if it was on accident or intentionally. Someone's on fire, you dumbasses. But anyways, after reviewing surveillance video from inside the subway car, law enforcement noticed the assailant sitting across from the victim, who, as we said, was asleep when she was attacked.

The video showed Sebastian approach her, light her clothes on fire, as well as a blanket that she had over her. Then he exited the train, sat down on a bench, watched as she burned. CNN reports that Debarina appeared to have some mobility issues. There was a walker found at the scene. She had a lot of clothes and fabric around her, which police officials believe helped accelerate the fire. Now, Sebastian is a Guatemalan citizen. He entered the United States illegally sometime within the past six years, according to CNN, and reportedly, Border Patrol encountered him in Sonita, Arizona on June 1st, 2018, at which point he was returned to Guatemala six days later. But then at some point, on an unknown date and at an unknown

location, he re-entered the U.S. He was not arrested at the scene of his crime. He fled the scene eventually, I guess, after the show was done for him. But the police released a picture, pictures of him from surveillance, like screenshots, and he was recognized by three high school age New Yorkers who called the police. And when he was apprehended, Zepeda Khalil had a lighter in his pocket. They keep saying this, by the way, in articles, like he had a lighter in his pocket. To me, that's like, okay, I hope you have more than that. Lots of people have lighters in their pocket. But Eric Adams, who's somehow the mayor of New York City, I don't know how this happened. He's not the best, in my opinion. He's too busy doing perp walks with, uh, Luigi Mangione.

Yeah. Too busy doing that. And, and he's, he's, he, he does some other things. I don't know if you know, but they're investigating him for a bunch of other stuff now. But anyways, Eric Adams is like, listen, guys, it's not that bad because everyone was like, yo, the subways are horrendous. Like do something. And he's like, no, no, no.

It's actually not that bad. Like, we've had a great year for crime on the subway. But like, yeah, these horrible things that are happening are overshadowing our success in 2024 with transit crime. And he said that, he said, quote, we are doing the job on bringing down the numbers. But as I say over and over, and I said in 2022, New Yorkers must feel safe. People are seeing and feeling what they're reading. So our success is overshadowed, end quote. I hate politicians with a burning passion, okay?

We don't want to hear this right now, Eric Adams, all right? What people who live in New York City want to hear is this is horrendous. I understand your outrage. I, too, as a human being and a New Yorker, am outraged. And as my job as mayor and a former police officer, by the way, OK, a former police officer, Eric Adams, my job as a human and as the mayor of your great city is to make this city a place you deserve to live. And I will do everything I can not to be like, we've been doing a really good job and you're not giving us enough credit. No one wants to hear that shit right now, dude. I'm disgusted about it. I'm disgusted that this is his response, honestly. He should be saying, you're absolutely right. It's out of control and we're going to do what we can to fix it. But now you've got, you know,

they're coming up with all these, I guess there's been six incidents on the subway that were pretty bad. The arsons slaying tipped subway murders to 10, I'm sorry, not six, 10 this year, doubling the number of murders in 2023 and matching a 25-year high reached in 2022. So Eric Adams is like, it really was bad in 2022. 2023 was a little bit better. 2024, not as good as 2023, but trust me, we're trying our best. And I guess other attacks were also at high levels. One person got pushed in front of a train in Manhattan, actually shortly after Adam's press conference. So this is not something that's going to stop. And once again, like I said, if you keep getting up there as the politician, as the leader

of the city and saying, hey, we're doing our best here. You're really not giving us credit for all the great things we've done. Instead of saying, but within no uncertain terms, anyone who commits crimes like this on the subway or anywhere else in New York City will be prosecuted to the highest degree of the law. Watch yourself. Don't do it. Don't do it.

That's the message that he should be sending to the people who want to commit these violent crimes against innocent people who are doing nothing but minding their own business. Eric Adams' message out of his stupid mouth should be, don't. Don't, because we'll come for you. But instead, he's protecting himself, his image, the job that he's done, and the job that the NYPD has done. No one wants to hear that. What do you think, Derek? So with this case, the reason why I believe it's so prevalent in the news is for a couple things, and we've already talked about some of it. For one, you talked about New York City, not just New York as a whole, but New York City

specifically, and how the crime's out of control there. I don't think anybody would dispute that. It's pretty rough in that area, and there's some things that need to change. And we talked about the issues as to why that may be. Well, one, it's some of the policies that are in place when it comes to people who commit crime, but it's also the level of quality we have with those officers in that area. And that's not just a New York City problem. That's a country problem, which we've also talked about. We got to raise the standards. We got to raise the qualifications. And that kind of plays into the visual that we had

of Dabrina actually burning on camera and a police officer with his back to her. It's just a terrible look. It's just a terrible look. And it's kind of a microcosm for how people are viewing law enforcement, specifically in areas like New York City right now. It's really, really bad. And there needs to be change immediately. And I agree with everything you said as far as how Eric Adams handled it. And I do feel like Eric Adams is a typical politician. He speaks out of both sides of his mouth. Like I said, there was something, and we're not even talking about it tonight, but something that really pissed me off is these perp walks that they're doing with Luigi Mangione,

where they have everyone and their brother walking behind him. Listen, this guy doesn't have superpowers. He doesn't need 30 guys walking with him. It's all for show. He's not like an X-Man. He's not freaking Thor. He's not going to rip out of his chains. That's Superman. So the fact that all these people are walking with him, they're just trying to get their shine. It's all for self-serving purposes. There's no need for the mayor of New York City to be walking with Luigi Mangione. There's no reason. Exactly. Enough. He's been caught. Move on. Yeah, he's been caught. Move on. It's not, you know, you could

have maybe prevented something like this by having, you know, better laws, but different, different story for a different day. And then the final thing is the obvious thing, right? Sebastian being a legal immigrant, carrying out this horrific crime. Here's my outlook on it. I don't think anybody would argue with the notion that we have enough criminals here that are here legally. We don't want illegal people here committing crime as well. I think everyone agrees with that. The problem here, which I think even people on the right can't really defend, is this person was deported. They did catch him. They did get him out of the country. He came back in. And that speaks to border policies, right? And having a better border so that these people aren't able

to do that, which I'm fully in support of. We need to have a better border so that people are not coming across into our country without our knowing, especially if they're violent offenders. And I will say, especially if there's no record of them being here, because even if he left fingerprints, if he left, he's not in the system. He could be in the system. So here's the thing. I've had, he could be, if he'd been arrested before, he could be in the system. What I had happen a lot is I would arrest someone for whatever it might be, domestic violence, could be a license, whatever it is. I fingerprint them and they tell me a certain name. And when I fingerprint them, it comes back to a different name. And then it also comes back to a different name. And what I find through the

process of the investigation is that this person's been arrested four or five different times and given a different name every time. And they're able to get their own IDs, you know, fake IDs so that if you're not really paying attention, it can slip through the cracks. So then what would happen just in my anecdotal experience, we would call ICE and we would say, hey, we have this guy, pretty sure he's been arrested four or five times under different names looks like he's someone who just keeps getting arrested and not showing up to court what do you want us to do we got him for a uh we got him for a domestic violence domestic assault it's a misdemeanor right they would go yeah let him go let him go with it let him go with a court date and i'd say yeah but no i don't think you're following me what i'm saying is he's already been

arrested like four or five times i I have different names with the same fingerprints. It looks like he's been arrested. Maybe he has multiple warrants. He's already proven he's not going to show up. And they would say, I don't know what to tell you, brother. Nothing we can do. That's the policy. Let him go. And I, okay, no problem. Let him go with his arraignment date. And sure enough, he didn't show up. So that's a different thing though with this case. Like that's obviously an actual problem, but this one starts at the border, right? Like they caught him, they sent him back

and he just came over again. So it's a bigger issue, which people are latching onto for their own political agendas, which I hate, but it is a real problem that we have to fix. I don't know. Well, don't forget New York City was announced proudly. It was a sanctuary city. It's a sanctuary city. Rhode Island is Rhode Island is as well. And so they're

going to go where they're wherever they want to go anyways. But yeah, it's, it's something that is a much bigger issue. I just hate the fact that, you know, DeBrina and others are, are their, their tragedies are politicized because truthfully, I don't believe most of the politicians give a shit about DeBrina or these other people who have been victims of these crimes, and they're using it to benefit their own agenda, which is unfortunate. But I think at the root of the issue, most commonsensical people can agree, regardless of politics, we need to do better. We need to do better. And it's not just one thing. It's not just changing the law. It's not just hiring better, more capable law enforcement officers. It's not just having a better border. It's a lot of things that have to happen in order to accomplish this mission.

And unfortunately, one thing being changed is not going to do it. Nobody can work together, by the way. Yeah, we have to work together. So that's kind of how I feel about it. I don't think it's one thing, like one switch that we can turn on or off that's going to make it better. It's a lot of things that need to change. And I think most people, regardless of where you fall, we all agree for the most part. We're much more on the same page than we are divided.

That's for sure. And we just got to start using common sense and saying, OK, this is wrong. Let's fix it. I have a question for you. And I want the viewers, if you're watching on YouTube, to weigh in as well. Does it sometimes feel like politicians don't actually want to fix these problems because then it doesn't give them anything to publicly argue about and or platform themselves on when they're running for election or reelection? Of course that's the case. I wrote a book years ago about, and I wrote a whole chapter on liars.

And one of the examples I gave was politicians and how they use certain things to support an agenda when they, and they present it as something where they're noble and they're trying to make it right. I'm not painting all politicians as bad people. They're just very hard to trust. I absolutely am painting all politicians as bad people. You don't think there are any good politicians out there that come in to do the right thing? No, I think that politics as a whole draws in the wrong type of person. And I think maybe like hundreds of years ago when they were setting up this system and they really had the right intentions. But that is assuming that everybody who's going into politics has the right intentions. And unfortunately, going into politics, you have people who are hungry for power, hungry for attention. And even if they do, and a lot of politicians who have left the public eye have said this,

even I went in with the best intentions. I went in genuinely wanting change. And then I realized that's not how the system worked. And that's not how it was set up. And so they either just join the fray and become like that, or they just, they're done and they leave. And there's no positive change made because every person who actually wants to make positive change is shown pretty soon off the bat. Like, that's not what you're here for. You're just here to

scream at each other on CNN and Fox News and pretend you're doing things so that the American people can keep fighting amongst themselves. And we can keep this whole two-party system thing going where nobody ever knows what the hell is going on. It's pretty bad in my opinion. I think the whole thing needs to be burned down and built back up. Good luck with that. I know. I know. I know.

I mean, listen, and I – we kind of got off the rails here. We're both guilty of it. I'm about to live off the grid, okay? Yeah. I mean, it's's yeah, for real. But to bring it back to what we're talking about today, we definitely need change on a on a on a on an individual level where we need administrators in these local cities and towns to take a look at their law enforcement officers, to look at the policies, the ordinances that are in place, to look at the local laws, and to deter people from committing this type of crime. As far as this specific issue with Sebastian, there's a lot of conversations around the border right now. I think even on both sides, people agree. I see it all the time. We both agree we need a stronger border. How do we implement that

while still being fair to people and allowing this country to continue to thrive on what it's thrived for since the beginning of time which is immigration having people from other countries come in here and make this place better so there's i mean my father my father's an immigrant and like i respect him so much so he's responsible for bringing you here yeah jesus But I respect him so much because it's like you came here, you didn't know the language, you had nothing, you turned yourself into a successful businessman. That is the American dream, right? So no, no one's saying immigrants are bad.

We're saying violent criminals, whether you're in this country or outside the country, are bad. We just don't want any more violent criminals because we've got our share to deal with here. We've got our fair share here. Exactly. We got, I mean, listen, a lot of these mass shooters, almost all of them, they're homegrown. They're homegrown. Johnny, Jimmy, and Timmy are all from here. So let's fix that too. And I think that's where the diversion- Well, and that's also a mental health crisis thing. There's so much going on. We got our own problems. So taking on more is not, the glass is already full, right? The glass is already full. We're tired. We're at capacity. I do feel, I don't know, but I feel like

there could be a change. I feel like there could be, with all these things happening now, I do feel like there's a different level that politicians are being held to, a different level of accountability, especially with social media and the ability to go and track. Like, for example, we're able to track politicians' trades in the market, right? And we're able to see how much money they're making and what they're investing in. See, I don't think politicians should be allowed to trade in the market. Completely agree. Hello? Completely agree.

And I'm not going to call politicians because it's going to sound like I'm on one side or the other. I have a list of names right now in my head because I am very familiar with this issue. Politicians who aren't. There's apps you can download that you will trade based on how they're trading. It's horrible. And it's up like, you know, it's all in the green. It's all in the green. So for us not to believe that they have something

that we don't know about. It's called insider trading. Yeah, exactly. Is that what it's called? It is. I mean, Martha Stewart went to prison for it, but nobody else will. It's bad.

And so overall thinking of DeBrina, her family, her friends, anybody connected to this, thinking about the good people of New York City, because most people there are good people. And like you said, it was a beautiful city at one point. Oh I'm hoping it can get back there. It was magic. I'm hoping it can get back there because I will say this, as much as we've talked negatively about it, and I do have a little bit more concern when I go there, there are still some amazing spots. Like when I do bring my family out there, they love going to

see the tree and, you know, during Christmas during Christmas time. Historical sites for galore. You wouldn't believe, man. Just Trinity Cemetery alone is, I have goosebumps. Central Park. Central Park is beautiful. If you've ever had the chance to go there, go. The old brownstones, just knowing that they've been there for centuries. It's just such a cool place. New York City has some of the most incredibly illustrious history, not even on the East Coast, in the country. And it's destroyed. It's destroyed. And honestly, I'm glad you have hope that things will change. I don't.

So I'm just going to hold out my hope because I'm sick of being let down. I do believe that a couple things, changes in policy, procedure, laws, could start to really, it's going to take years, but it could start to, again, swing things the other way. Sometimes you make a correction and you overcorrect for something that's wrong because there are problems with law enforcement and stop and frisk was, it was, it was hairy. They needed to be some changes, but instead they got rid of it altogether, which was the exact opposite. So there's different things that need to happen. We need to tinker with it. We need to find that happy medium so that people are allowed to live their lives the way they want to live them, but also we're protecting the people who need that protection.

So I think this is just another classic example with this case of- An overcorrection. Overcorrection and things not being the way they need to be. We need to do better. And I'm hoping that with these incidences occurring at the frequency they're occurring right now, there is some change and that the legislators are held accountable for what's going to happen in the years to come. Any final words from you? No, I'm ready to dive in. I feel like the comments are going to be popping on this one because I hate talking politics because we're not a political. We're not talking politics. We're talking. We're not. But we are. And you know how it is. Well, I don't I don't I

don't dabble in politics. I don't like or trust any politicians. Therefore, none of them can hold sway over me. They're just hyped up influencers now. And I'm sick of them. We are a true crime channel, but true crime, crime, shouldn't say true crime, crime and politics go hand in hand. They certainly do. Because a lot of the crimes that are occurring, not all of them, potentially could have been prevented by better policy. You think? And better laws. So, and also better, better enforcement of those laws, right? We talk about it all the time. So it does go hand in hand. And although I try to separate the two,

they do kind of cross-pollinate a lot and it's almost impossible. So love to hear the comments. Let us know what you think. Do we got this one wrong? Is New York the safest city in the country and we're just completely oblivious to it. We want to hear your thoughts. So on a positive note. Is New York the safest city in the country? That was sarcasm. That was sarcasm.

That was definitely sarcasm. But we do wish everyone a happy new year. We have a part six of the Karen Reed series coming up later this week. It'll be the sixth and final part. We're going to wrap it up with some final theories that Stephanie's going to go over, and then we're going to give our final opinions on Karen Reid, John O'Keefe, and this whole situation. So please make sure you subscribe, turn your notifications on, like the videos if you're watching on YouTube. And if you're on audio, I have seen an uptick in the comments. Keep them coming. If you take two seconds, leave a comment. If you're someone who's

been listening to us for a long time, we'd appreciate a review. We're up around 9,000 reviews right now. I'd love to see us hit 10,000 in 2025. That'd be amazing. There's a resolution. So that's my final words. Anything from you? No, I'm good. I'm ready to dive in and finish up the Karen Reed and John O'Keefe case because it's hurting my brain. It's going to be a good one. Make sure you check that out. Everyone stay safe out there.

We'll see you later this week. Have a good night. Bye.