OAN Staff Blake Wolf
6:15 PM – Monday, September 8, 2025
Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles is facing criticism after urging compassion for the man accused of fatally stabbing a female Ukrainian refugee on a train in August.
The murder of 23-year-old Iryna Zarutska, a Ukrainian refugee who recently moved to the United States to escape the war, has garnered significant outrage on social media after emerging last week due to the gruesome and unprovoked nature of the attack.
The violent stabbing took place on the Lynx Blue Line train in Charlotte, North Carolina, on August 22nd after Zarutska unknowingly sat in front of the suspect, 35-year-old Decarlos Brown.
Lyles has since responded to the attack, calling on the community to treat Brown with “compassion” due to his apparent struggle with “homelessness and mental health.”
“This is a tragic situation that sheds light on problems with society safety nets related to mental healthcare and the systems that should be in place,” Lyles wrote in a statement to a local reporter after the attack.
Lyles went on to claim that Brown “appears to have suffered a crisis” during the attack, while explaining that “we will never arrest our way out [of] issues such as homelessness and mental health.”
The Democrat mayor continued, noting that Brown, an apparent homeless individual, “needs to be treated with the same compassion, diligence and commitment as cancer and heart disease.”
Lyles added that she is not participating in “villainizing those who struggle with their mental health or those who are unhoused.”
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump slammed the suspect as a “mentally deranged lunatic” and a “well-known career criminal, who had been previously arrested and released on CASHLESS BAIL in January, a total of 14 TIMES.”
The president issued his outrage over the murder in a Monday Truth Social post, criticizing Democrat policies for directly allowing the suspect to roam the streets despite repeated arrests.
“What the hell was he doing riding the train, and walking the streets? Criminals like this need to be LOCKED UP. The blood of this innocent woman can literally be seen dripping from the killer’s knife, and now her blood is on the hands of the Democrats who refuse to put bad people in jail,” Trump continued.
“North Carolina, and every State, needs LAW AND ORDER, and only Republicans will deliver it! Additionally, where is the outrage from the Mainstream Media on this horrible tragedy?” the president added, while endorsing Michael Whatley, the former Republican National Committee Chairman, for U.S. Senate.
“HE WON’T LET THIS HAPPEN AGAIN!”
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