The Blue Line light rail crossing at 9th Street Station in Charlotte, North Carolina, Sunday, Nov. 16, 2025. Photo by Jinrui Liu.
Audio by Jinrui Liu
NARRATOR:
The killing of 21-year-old Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska shattered something in Charlotte. For women who ride the Blue Line every day, the fear is personal, immediate, and hard to shake.
NAYA:
“It was really sad. I refused to watch the video that came out… the man on the camera. It affected me for like a week or two.”
NARRATOR:
And even now, routine trips to class feel different.
NAYA:
“I always ride in the very first car, right behind the driver, because that’s where I feel the safest. I try to angle my body… and I’ve seen a lot of women doing that.”
NARRATOR:
After the murder, the system moved quickly to show visible action. Some riders say it’s noticeable — if only slightly.
NAYA:
“There were more security officers, and they actually have these things to scan tickets now. I do feel a little bit safer… maybe like five percent.”
ROB DRINKWATER:
“Definitely a small police presence that historically was not there. My experiences on the light rail have always been good. I’ve never felt unsafe.”
NARRATOR:
But a stronger police presence doesn’t answer the question riders keep asking: why did this happen in the first place?
To understand that, you have to look far beyond the tracks — into North Carolina’s fractured mental-health system.
DR.EVAN ASHKIN:
“There’s a lack of robust community mental-health infrastructure that can realistically respond to people like him… because that’s not a unique situation at all.”
NARRATOR:
He describes a system where people cycle between jail, homelessness, and brief hospital stays — with little continuity or support.
DR.EVAN ASHKIN:
“You need to have peers, often, which these teams do — someone who can gain rapport and trust. There were probably many opportunities that were missed to try to help him, because we didn’t have adequate community support as he went in and out of the carceral system.”
NARRATOR:
Families, he adds, can only do so much without meaningful professional help.
Ashkin believes the new Forensic ACT teams — which go directly into the community — could have made a difference for Brown.
DR. EVAN ASHKIN:
“If he had had that kind of support — people who could work with the family, who might know where he’d likely be — it’s not unreasonable to think he would have gotten back on meds. You can bring medications to people, you can do therapy on the street or wherever they are.
Obviously there’s no way to know this for sure, but the probability that he would have been in treatment — and not psychotic and paranoid — is much higher than what we have at this point.”
NARRATOR:
City leaders, meanwhile, emphasize the limits of their authority — and point to steps the state has taken.
COUNCILMAN ED DRIGGS:
“Remember, there was a largely political attack on the city after Iryna. But some of these issues are actually in their court, not ours.
They created ten more district attorneys and five new staff members, and they toughened up requirements for magistrates. There was a cash-bail provision.
We’re going to move ahead with the plan to create a new transportation authority… and it will have its own police force.”
NARRATOR:
I’m Jinrui Liu reporting.
