It took police more than a week to publicly identify 57-year-old Debrina Kawam as the woman who was fatally set on fire in a New York subway train on Dec. 22. But on the internet, it took just hours for a false name to begin spreading. In posts that circulated widely on social media after Kawam’s death, users claimed without evidence that the victim was a 29-year-old named “Amelia Carter.” Many highlighted the immigration status of the man charged in Kawam’s death — who federal immigration officials say is a Guatemalan citizen who entered the U.S. illegally — while accusing the media of refusing to name the “beautiful young white woman.”
