The man accused of fatally stabbing Iryna Zarutska, a Ukrainian refugee murdered while riding a North Carolina light rail train in 2025, has been found “incapable to proceed” with his pending state murder case.
Ahead of her death in August 2025, Zarutska, 23, was working in Charlotte at a pizzeria and had been enrolled in a local community college after she fled the war in Ukraine, according to WCNC.
On August 23, 2025, Decarlos Brown killed Zarutska in an attack on a Charlotte light rail train, the TV station reported. He faces state and federal charges in connection with her death, and is currently in federal custody, according to reports.
Following Brown’s indictment on a first-degree murder charge in state Superior Court, prosecutors applied for a Rule 24 hearing to declare whether they would pursue the death penalty, according to court filings. The hearing is scheduled for April 30.
In a Tuesday, April 7, motion viewed by Us Weekly, his public defender, Daniel P. Roberts, shared the outcome of Brown’s capacity evaluation that was conducted at a hospital following his arrest.
Brown, 35, has been found “incapable to proceed,” according to a December 29, 2025, report made by Central Regional Hospital, Roberts wrote in the filing.
Roberts motioned to have Brown’s Rule 24 hearing delayed for about six months because he needs to have a capacity hearing in connection with the hospital’s findings, according to the April 7 filing. It is up to a judge to accept the hospital’s determination.
“A capacity hearing is a ‘critical stage’ hearing that cannot currently take place while the defendant remains in federal custody for the parallel federal proceedings,” Brown wrote in the motion. “Furthermore, should the court accept the findings of Central Regional Hospital, any resulting orders to attempt to ‘restore capacity’ to the Defendant cannot be effectuated while the Defendant is in Federal custody.”
State prosecutors have agreed to the delaying Brown’s Rule 24 hearing, the motion notes.
In Brown’s federal case, a judge has ordered Brown to undergo a second psychiatric evaluation while he faces a federal murder charge over Zarutska’s death, the Charlotte Observer reported.
His deadly attack against Zarutska was caught on video, according to state court filings.
After Zarutska boarded the Charlotte light rail train in August 2025, she sat in front of Brown, an affidavit says.
Surveillance footage from the train car showed Brown, minutes later, pulling a knife from his pocket, unfolding it and stabbing Zarutska in the throat, according to the filing. She was ultimately found dead inside the train car.
None of the other train passengers were seen trying to help her in any way.
Following the stabbing, President Donald Trump said that Brown should face the death penalty, according to the Charlotte Observer.
