One year after Iryna Zarutska murder, violent crimes fuel North Carolina public safety debate

A year after Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska was stabbed to death on a Charlotte light-rail train, a string of violent attacks involving people with extensive arrest records has kept North Carolina’s public-safety debate in the spotlight.

The one year milestone falls as the North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police (NCFOP) endorsed Republican U.S.

Senate candidate Michael Whatley, citing concerns about repeat offenders, bail policies and support for law enforcement.

Zarutska, 23, was sitting aboard Charlotte’s Lynx Blue Line on Aug.

22, 2025, when authorities said Decarlos Brown Jr. pulled a knife and stabbed her three times from behind before leaving the train.

PROSECUTORS SAY CHARLOTTE TRAIN STABBING CASE WON'T BE DISMISSED REGARDLESS OF COMPETENCY RULING Brown, 34, has been found incompetent to stand trial in both his state and federal cases.

Zarutska’s killing helped prompt North Carolina’s Iryna’s Law, which tightened bail rules and increased oversight of defendants considered a risk to public safety.

NCFOP President Chet Effler told Fox News Digital the union’s roughly 6,000 members backed Whatley over concerns about repeat offenders, bail policies and support for law enforcement.

"We have lost accountability in this country," Effler said.

"There’s no reason to be soft on crime whenever you have victims who are going to be victims of those crimes for years to come." Effler also pointed to the arrest of Charlotte man Di-Quan Schafar Hunt as an example of what he described as a recurring failure to hold repeat offenders accountable.

CHARLOTTE CAREER CRIMINAL RECORDS HIMSELF PUNCHING WOMAN IN UNPROVOKED ATTACK, POSTING TO SOCIAL MEDIA: POLICE Hunt, 32, had been arrested on charges at least nine times since 2023, records show.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg police said they arrested him after officers responding to an attempt-to-locate call were shown a social-media account containing videos detectives had already been investigating.

Police said one video was tied to a July 30 assault in which Hunt allegedly punched a woman on a Charlotte sidewalk before fleeing.

The woman suffered serious but non-life-threatening injuries, authorities said.