America's Talking - Two weeks later, outrage rises in Charlotte rail killing

Episode Date: September 13, 2025

(The Center Square) – Chilling video of the Aug. 22 stabbing death of Iryna Zarutska on a Charlotte light rail has drawn increased awareness of the incident. Included are social media audiences wondering about the lack of national mainstream media coverage, and second-term Republican President Donald Trump. He’s not only vowed to crack down on crime but sought to take action including through use of National Guard troops in certain cities.Support this podcast: https://secure.anedot.com/franklin-news-foundation/ce052532-b1e4-41c4-945c-d7ce2f52c38a?source_code=xxxxxx Read more: https://www.thecentersquare.com/north_carolina/article_9490bdb5-4fed-4f9e-918b-0b9d4b1a9e3e.html Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to America's Talking. I'm Kristen Smith, Center Square's Northeast Regional Editor. Joining me today is the Center Squares East Coast Managing Editor Alan Wooten. This week, Alan's been following all the developments in the stabbing death of 23-year-old Arena Zarutka on the Charlotte Light Rail System. That actually happened a few weeks ago now. But she's risen to the top of the news stories, and I want you to tell us a little bit more about what happened. Well, Kristen, it's very sad story. She boarded a train in Charlotte down the south end on a Friday night, about 10 o'clock. And didn't seem to have any interaction with the Carlos Brown Jr.

And a couple or minutes, about four minutes into the train ride, he just stands up and stabs her to death. It was horrifying. The local media did cover it when it happened. It was a homicide that weekend. But it was last week on Friday late when Charlotte Mecklenburg Police released video. As we've seen many other times in other instances, video release tends to change the narrative, amplifies things. It just is different than reading it on a page as to what happened. And certainly that has happened.

In this case, it grabbed the attention of the president, a lot of those lawmakers. So Brown has been arrested. He is in jail. He's facing charges on state and federal level. But he's got a history with mental health issues. And a story this week in the New York Post and some other places indicated that conversations he's had with one of his family members, it's very disturbing as far as the mental health issues that he's facing. He believes that something inside of him controlled him and made him do what he did. So it's a tough situation.

Given his history, not just with mental health issues, but arrest 15 times over the last 15 years, as you have written, what has this drawn in conversation from lawmakers about how we should handle situations like this and whether past policies have really contributed to what happened? Well, that is a point that's being handled. hammered. It's being hammered at the federal level, even before this rose to the top of the news cycle early in the week. President Trump has wanted to hit back on soft on crime policies in certain jurisdictions yesterday in Raleigh at the legislative building press conference involving both leaders of the General Assembly and a U.S. Senate candidate. And they didn't give specifics as to

what they were going to do other than the legislature is coming back on the week of September 22. They will have a bill package is how it was described. And they're looking at a couple of different things. One of the things related to mental health is possibly trying to make it where right now, magistrates in North Carolina are able to, they've got a pretty wide latitude as to what they can do with bail. and that kind of thing. In domestic situations, though, there's a 48-hour period,

and then a district court judge has to be the one to handle that. So they may put that more in line with the domestic situation as well. The other thing they're looking at is just the oversight of the mattresses, the training that they get. Right now, the magistrates really don't have an answering. they described it yesterday as answering at the ballot box or in any other way. So they're looking at trying to rein that in a little bit and see what they can do there. There's also been requests from different groups about classifying this as a hate crime.

That hasn't happened yet, right? Not to my knowledge as we record, but I do anticipate that could happen. I think the mental health issue part may play a role in whether they would do that or not. But there is video. We did not confirm it, but with him saying that I got that white girl, she is from the Ukraine. He is a black man. But, you know, we'll have to see what they do on that. I kind of thought that might be a charge that would come early, actually.

It did not. But there has been a group that has requested that. I'm sure other groups are looking at it. And it's in the conversation. but he does have a federal charge because he committed a homicide on a, he's charged with committing a homicide on a federal mass transit system. And then, of course, the North Carolina is charged with first degree murder. All right, Alan.

Thanks for coming on today to explain this very tragic story to keep up with this and more. Follow us at the center square.com.