A high school senior who admitted setting a fire that severely burned a homeless man on the subway was sentenced in Manhattan federal court to 5 1/2 years in prison.

Judge Lewis J. Liman sentenced 19-year-old Hiram Carrero to more than the mandatory minimum sentence for arson after the young man pleaded guilty in March, according to a statement.

The fire, which occurred in the early hours of December 1, 2025, was part of a series of attacks with people burned on public transportation throughout the United States.

In a pre-sentence request, prosecutors asked that he serve up to eight years in prison, arguing that Carrero's "egregious actions" left the man, who was sleeping at the time, severely injured and with extensive permanent scarring and disfigurement.

During his guilty plea, Carrero admitted to intentionally setting fire to a piece of paper that injured the man.

In court documents, prosecutors claimed Carrero attempted to kill “a sleeping homeless man by burning him alive and leaving him trapped in a moving subway car.”

They said the man's life was saved only by the quick intervention of emergency personnel, after a fortunately short ride from Penn Station on 34th Street to Times Square.

Prosecutors noted that the crime was distinguished from murder by mere chance and criticized his explanation that he had drunk and smoked marijuana that day.

In her request for clemency for her client, defense attorney Jennifer Brown noted in court documents that he had a troubled past, beginning when he was born prematurely with drugs in his system and was abandoned by his biological parents at the hospital after his birth.

With an intellectual disability, “her life fell apart” when the pandemic hit in 2020, preventing her from attending school, the lawyer wrote. “Words cannot express the deep shame and remorse that Hiram feels,” Brown said.