North Carolina man charged for killing Ukrainian refugee, Trump demands death penalty

Editor's note: The story was updated with Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene's reaction.  

The U.S. Department of Justice on Sept. 9 charged 34-year-old Decarlos Brown with the murder of Iryna Zarutska, a 23-year-old Ukrainian refugee who was fatally stabbed aboard a train in North Carolina last month, Reuters reported.

Brown now faces a federal charge of murder committed on public transportation, in addition to an earlier state charge of first-degree murder.

Zarutska, who came to the U.S. in 2022 after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, was killed on Aug. 22. On Sept. 5, video footage showing Brown stabbing her in the throat surfaced online and was circulated by conservative commentators as alleged evidence of rising crime in Democrat-led cities.

While both charges are eligible for the death penalty, North Carolina has not executed since 2006, and the federal government last conducted executions in 2021, according to Reuters.

"Iryna Zarutska was a young woman living the American dream — her horrific murder is a direct result of 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," Bondi added.

U.S. President Donald Trump, who has blamed Democratic criminal justice policies for the killing of the Ukrainian woman, called on Sept. 10 for a swift trial and the death penalty for Brown.

"There can be no other option," Trump wrote on Truth Social.

Intercom CEO Eoghan McCabe, who was one of the donors to Trump's presidential campaign, proposed on X commissioning murals of Zarutska in prominent American cities.

McCabe pledged $500,000 in grants of $10,000 each to support the initiative. Tech billionaire Elon Musk responded to the post, expressing support and offering to contribute $1 million toward the project.

In recent days, Musk, along with several conservative English-speaking commentators and some White House officials, has repeatedly posted about Zarutska's killing. At the same time, he has shared content claiming that there is a correlation between race and crime rates.

Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene responded to Zarutska's murder by announcing plans to introduce amendments aimed at halting U.S. financial aid to Ukraine.

In a social media post on X, Greene described the murder as race-driven and shared a screenshot from The Kyiv Independent highlighting how right-wing figures in the U.S. and Europe are using the tragic stories of Zarutska and other Ukrainian refugees to fuel fear and promote racist and xenophobic policies.

Marjorie Taylor Greene is spreading lies about Ukraine’s protests. Russia is taking note.

On July 22 and 23, Ukrainians took to the streets in the country’s first mass anti-government protests since the outbreak of Russia’s full-scale invasion three and a half years earlier. Thousands of citizens rallied in cities across the country on the first night with a clear goal: to urge President Volodymyr Zelensky to veto a bill passed in parliament that guts anti-corruption reforms, and to express anger with recent government attacks on anti-corruption figures. But that didn’t stop the fr

The Kyiv IndependentAndrea Januta

"I will be introducing an amendment today to stop our tax dollars from going over to Ukraine to kill people. Our American tax dollars need to stay home and be used to stop monsters from killing innocent people. And yes, it was a race-driven murder," Greene wrote on X.

This is not Greene's first controversial statement regarding Ukraine. In July, she claimed that mass protests in Ukraine against a bill undermining anti-corruption reforms were allegedly driven by public frustration with President Volodymyr Zelensky over the absence of a peace deal with Russia.

Brown, who is African American, has a history of arrests and pleaded guilty to armed robbery in 2014, serving six years in prison.

His mother told local media that he had previously been involuntarily hospitalized and diagnosed with schizophrenia.

After his arrest on murder charges, a judge ordered Brown to undergo a psychiatric evaluation at a hospital for at least 60 days, according to court records.

How the right wing in US, Europe is weaponizing murders of Ukrainian refugees

Iryna Zarutska and her family fled Ukraine in 2022 to escape the threat of Russia’s full-scale war against her homeland, seeking safety and the promise of a new life in the United States. But that hope was shattered when she was brutally murdered in August on public transit in Charlotte, North Carolina. Decarlos Brown Jr., a homeless man with a history of violent crime and mental health issues, was taken into custody shortly after the unprovoked attack and charged with first-degree murder. Lead

The Kyiv IndependentKate Tsurkan