By Elizabeth Wolfe, Jeff Winter, TuAnh Dam, CNN

(CNN) — Iryna Zarutska was just another passenger when she boarded the late-night Blue Line train after it pulled into Scaleybark station, just a few miles outside of downtown Charlotte. She wore khaki pants and a dark shirt. Her long blonde hair had been tucked under a hat from Zepeddie’s Pizzeria where she worked.

Like nearby passengers, the 23-year-old bowed her head as the train continued on, absorbed by the phone in her hand. Zarutska, a refugee from Ukraine, had picked an empty row, and sat in front of a man in a red sweatshirt, unaware of the two’s imminent collision course.

Just four minutes later, Decarlos Brown, the passenger behind her, dug into the fold of his clothes and took out what appeared to be a knife. For a moment, he looked back out the window, as if that was all he was going to do. But in a quick movement, he launched up and swung his arm over the seat and fatally stabbed Zarutska, who clutched her face and throat before slouching to the ground.

Zarutska died on the train from her injuries as passengers kneeled over her trying to help. Brown has been charged with first-degree murder in her killing.

In the days after the release of video of the attack, the stabbing and Brown’s lengthy criminal history – including convictions for armed robbery, larceny and breaking and entering – have been decried by the Trump administration and conservative politicians as an example of the violent crime they say plagues many Democrat-led cities across the United States.

The crime has become a rallying cry as the administration seeks to justify the deployment of federal troops to Los Angeles and Washington, DC, even as President Donald Trump threatens to deploy the National Guard to Chicago.

“North Carolina, and every State, needs LAW AND ORDER, and only Republicans will deliver it!,” Trump said on Truth Social. He called Brown a “career criminal.”

Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles and Brown’s family have both said the killing is in part due to failures of a court system that allowed Brown to re-enter the community despite a record of mental illness, and convictions for armed robbery, felony larceny and breaking and entering.

Ultimately, the paths of two people fatally converged – a woman who escaped violence only to face it in the US and a man whose family members believe he was failed by both the criminal justice and the health care system.

Zarutska embraced US life

Zarutska had a gift. Her mother called it an “artist’s gift.” It wasn’t her ability to sculpt or design clothes – though she loved to do that. Zarutska, who had a degree in art and restoration from Synergy College in Kyiv, often bestowed her art on family and friends.

Her “artist’s gift” was what her mother affectionately called her ability to sleep for “wonderfully long stretches.”

She was a homebody, and “happiest when surrounded by family and loved ones,” her family said in her obituary.

Zarutska left Ukraine in August 2022, six months after Russia invaded, to escape the war.

Lonnie, a family friend, told CNN affiliate WCNC Zarutska endured daily bombing in Ukraine and the agony of not knowing “if you’re going to live or breathe another day.”

She fled with her mother, sister and brother, found a home in North Carolina and embraced life in Charlotte. She attended Rowan-Cabarrus Community College, and dreamed of becoming a veterinary assistant.

“She often cared for her neighbors’ pets, and many fondly remember seeing her walking them through the neighborhood, always with her radiant smile,” her family said.

Zarutska worked in a lively area of the lower South End dotted with breweries, apartment complexes and coffee shops. The 2007 debut of the light rail system helped fuel the neighborhood’s rise.

She had been inching toward independence and learning to drive, they said. But in the meantime, she would take the train.

‘I knew he was battling’

Days before the stabbing, Brown, showed up at his mother’s house. Michelle Dewitt said her son, who was homeless and living at a local shelter, asked to stay the night.

Later that morning, Brown’s mother dropped him off at a Statesville Avenue shelter, a few miles away from the Scaleybark station. She hugged him and told her son she loved him, she said, before heading to church.

When she found out about the stabbing and his arrest, Dewitt couldn’t believe it was her son. She had kicked him out before for becoming too violent, she told CNN affiliate WSOC. But still, she thought the identification of her son as a suspect must have been a mistake.

But Brown, who had a history of mental health issues, had been struggling in recent years, she said.

His sister, Tracey Brown, said he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and suffered hallucinations and paranoia.

Decarlos Brown had spent more than five years in prison for robbery with a dangerous weapon. And when he got out in 2020, his sister said she felt she was dealing with a different person.

“He didn’t seem like himself,” Tracey Brown said. Her brother struggled to have simple conversations and couldn’t hold down a job. He would sometimes become aggressive.

Decarlos attacked his sister in 2022, she told CNN. He bit her and broke the hinges of a door, but the sister said she decided to drop the charges out of concern for his mental health issues.

“I knew he was battling something,” Tracey Brown said. But the family struggled to get him help for his mental health.

Their mother had tried to get Brown placed in a long-term facility, Tracey Brown told CNN, but her attempts failed because she wasn’t his guardian.

He told his sister multiple times the government had implanted a chip in him, she said.

Earlier this year, Brown asked officers to investigate a “man-made” material that controlled when he ate, walked and talked, court documents state. Officers told Brown “the issue was a medical issue,” and there was nothing more they could do. Upset, he called 911. Brown was charged with misuse of 911, a class 1 misdemeanor.

His release was conditioned on a written promise he would appear for his next hearing, according to court records. The White House said his release left him “free to slaughter an innocent woman.”

Tracey Brown believes her brother suffered a disastrous mental break that night.

Video of the attack shows Brown fidgeting and restless. He nodded his head, then shook it. He sat, with his hood pulled over his long hair, abruptly upright and then slouched forward to rest his head on the seat in front of him. Occasionally, he swayed back and forth.

Finally, he attacked Zarutska, who had just boarded the train minutes prior. Charlotte had been her refuge from the violence abroad, but now Zarutska lost her life there.

“It’s very, very sickening and sad that we have such evil in our society today,” Lonnie, the family friend said.

Brown later told his sister he attacked the woman because she was reading his mind.

“A person that is hearing voices in their head and believes the world is against them, they’re going to break,” she told CNN.

“And I think that night he broke.”

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CNN’s Stephen Watts, Holly Yan, Sara Smart, Dianne Gallagher and Mia Blackman contributed to this report.