Attorney General Pam Bondi said Tuesday that they will seek the maximum penalty against the homeless man accused of killing a Ukrainian refugee on Charlotte, N.C., public transit on Aug. 22. File Photo by Will Oliver/UPI | License Photo
Federal prosecutors have charged a 34-year-old homeless man with murder for allegedly killing a Ukrainian refugee on public transit in Charlotte, N.C., last month.
Decarlos Dejuan Brown Jr. was charged Tuesday with one count of committing an act causing death on a mass transportation system and faces a statutory maximum sentence of life in prison or death, if convicted.
Prosecutors allege that Brown stabbed Iryna Zarutska, 23, to death on a Charlotte light-rail train the night of Aug. 22.
Officers arrested Brown at about 9:55 p.m. local time that night after being called to the scene by a witness reporting a woman was being stabbed by a Black man on the Lynx Blue Line.
Zarutska was found “lying on her back, deceased, next to a large amount of blood, with a single stab wound in the middle of her neck,” according to the criminal complaint.
Surveillance footage of the assault reviewed by investigators shows Zarutska entering the rail car and sitting down in the row ahead of the alleged attacker.
About four minutes later, Brown is accused of pulling out a knife and stabbing Zarutska three times from behind and then walking away.
Police arrested Brown on the rail platform.
“Iryna Zarutska was a young woman living the American dream — her horrific murder is a direct result of the failed soft-on-crime policies that put criminals before innocent people,” Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in a statement.
“We will seek the maximum penalty for this unforgivable act of violence — he will never again see the light of day as a free man.”
The murder of Zarutska has grabbed the attention of the nation and the Trump administration amid its crackdown on crime in Democratic-led cities.
In a video message earlier Tuesday, President Donald Trump referenced the crime as he criticized Democratic-run cities as well as Democratic politicians and officials.
“In every place they control, radical left judges, politicians and activists, and they’ve adopted a policy of catch and release for thugs and killers,” he said. “In Charlotte, N.C., we saw the results of these policies when a 23-year-old woman who came here from Ukraine met her bloody end on a public train.”
“We cannot allow a depraved criminal element of violent repeat offenders to continue spreading destruction and death throughout our country,” he added. “We have to respond with force and strength.”
Trump has already deployed the military to Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., two Democratic-led cities, to combat crime and has threatened Democratic leaders of other cities that he may send in the National Guard.
