Iryna Zarutska Murder One Year Later: Violent Crime Shapes North Carolina Public Safety Debate

One year after Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska was fatally stabbed aboard a Charlotte light-rail train, a series of violent incidents tied to suspects with lengthy arrest histories has continued to fuel North Carolina’s debate over public safety.

The anniversary comes as the North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police (NCFOP) threw its support behind Republican U.S. Senate candidate Michael Whatley, pointing to concerns over repeat offenders, bail practices and backing for law enforcement.

Zarutska, 23, was riding Charlotte’s Lynx Blue Line on Aug. 22, 2025, when authorities say Decarlos Brown Jr. approached from behind, drew a knife and stabbed her three times before exiting the train.

Brown, 34, has since been ruled incompetent to stand trial in both the state and federal cases against him.

Her death helped drive the passage of North Carolina’s Iryna’s Law, a measure designed to toughen bail requirements and expand scrutiny of defendants deemed potential threats to public safety.

NCFOP President Chet Effler told News Outlet that the organization’s roughly 6,000 members endorsed Whatley because of growing alarm over repeat criminal offenders, bail policy and the need for stronger support for police.

“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.

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.

Hunt’s record includes a December 2025 case involving charges of assault with a deadly weapon, communicating threats, second-degree trespass and two counts of carrying a concealed weapon. The booking record does not describe the underlying allegations or identify an alleged victim.

Records also list a September 2025 simple assault charge and a March 2025 charge of assault on a female. In 2024, Hunt was arrested in cases involving alleged violations of a domestic-violence protective order, breaking or entering and injury to personal property. He is a felon with at least six additional misdemeanor convictions in Mecklenburg County.

“You can’t hug your way out of crime,” Effler said. “You have to hold people accountable.”

Brown’s case and Hunt’s arrest are among several recent North Carolina crimes that have sharpened the debate over repeat offenders, bail and law enforcement resources.

In Jacksonville, DoorDash driver and mother of three Christen Phillips suffered skull fractures, brain bleeds and a fractured cheekbone after authorities said a man followed her and attacked her with a bat during an Aug. 1 delivery.

The Onslow County Sheriff’s Office said Phillips had honked at another driver while stopped at an intersection. Authorities said the driver, identified as 44-year-old Stanley Shockley, followed Phillips to a delivery stop and allegedly attacked her as she returned to her car.

Phillips was able to drive herself to a hospital after the attack. Shockley was charged with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury.

The public-safety concerns have also reached western North Carolina, where Asheville officials have described a series of deadly incidents involving young people as retaliatory violence but have resisted calling the activity gang-related.

Effler criticized that approach, arguing that officials must be candid about the nature of violent crime before they can address it.

“A criminal gang is a gang, I don’t care how old they are,” Effler said. “You have to address it.”

In Charlotte, another repeat offender, 29-year-old David Simpson, was charged with killing a man hours after his release on bond, renewing scrutiny of pretrial-release decisions.

Effler said people with repeated arrests for violent or assault-related offenses should not be allowed to cycle through the justice system without meaningful consequences.

North Carolina has also faced deadly shootings recently, outside its larger cities. In Winston-Salem, two people were killed and several others were wounded after what police said was a planned fight between juveniles that escalated into a shooting near a middle school.

Authorities said multiple people exchanged gunfire at Leinbach Park, near Jefferson Middle School. Some of those involved were juveniles, police said.

The shooting was not at the school, the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation said, but it underscored concerns over violent disputes that law-enforcement groups say have spread into communities across the state.

Effler said the cases involve different defendants and circumstances but reflect the same broader failure to hold dangerous offenders accountable before more people are harmed.

Effler also accused former Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper, Whatley’s opponent in the U.S. Senate race, of supporting cashless bail as governor.

“Cashless bail puts people on the streets that will arbitrarily walk up, like this Charlotte case and women getting assaulted and getting a video done,” Effler said. “You cannot allow a criminal to not be held accountable.”

A Cooper campaign spokesperson disputed Effler’s claim, telling News Outlet the former governor “oppos[ed] cashless bail while signing stricter bail laws and putting rapists and violent criminals behind bars.”

The campaign cited Cooper’s signing of the Pretrial Integrity Act, which tightened bail requirements for certain violent offenses and repeat defendants. It also said it returned the NCFOP’s endorsement questionnaire on Aug. 10, disputing Effler’s statement that the union had not received a response.

In a news release announcing the endorsement, Whatley said he was “honored” to receive the NCFOP’s backing and pledged to support law enforcement if elected. News Outlet has reached out to Whatley’s campaign for additional comment.

Effler said Whatley has committed to back the Protect and Serve Act, the HALO Act and other measures the union believes would provide officers with greater protection and resources.

“Michael Whatley has committed to the things that we believe in,” Effler said. “He’ll support actions that doesn’t defund law enforcement from doing the professional job that we need to do.”