CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- The fatal stabbing of a Ukrainian refugee on Charlotte’s light rail has rekindled conversations about the failures of America’s criminal justice system.

But some Charlotte advocates say an important component is being left out of the conversation: mental health.

Fonda Bryant, a Charlotte area mental health advocate, said Iryna Zarutska’s slaying on Aug. 22 was as much a failure of Charlotte’s mental system as it was public safety. DeCarlos Brown Jr., who is charged with Zarutska’s murder, experienced mental health struggles, his mother told The Charlotte Observer this week.

“We don’t have enough psychiatrists to help us,” said Bryant, the founder of the local nonprofit Wellness Action Recovery Inc. “And they’re the ones that prescribe the treatment and the medication for us.”

Challenges in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County include rising costs, a shrinking number of hospital beds and a lack of education about mental health, she said. The light rail stabbing has further exposed those problems, she said.

There is also a cultural problem, Bryant said. Many in the Black community don’t seek mental health treatment because of the stigma of doing so, she said.

Mass General Brigham reports on its website that 25% of Black people seek mental health treatment versus 40% of white people. Part of it is stigma, the National Alliance on Mental Illness website says, but it is also due to factors such as a lack of health insurance and bias from health providers.

Kate Weaver echoed several of the same concerns as Bryant. Weaver, the executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness in Charlotte, said many things are needed, but pointed to supportive housing, outpatient treatment and ongoing case management as key needs.

The Charlotte Observer in May examined Mecklenburg County’s mental healthcare system. People without health insurance cannot access services, services in the county are fragmented, and low income creates additional barriers for residents, especially residents of color, the story found.

Weaver said it’s important for families to keep in contact with healthcare providers and help break the stigma around mental health with their loved ones.

Weaver said the public generally doesn’t need to be concerned about people suffering mental health crises posing a safety threat. Most people who are suffering a mental illness are not violent, she said.

“Someone who has psychosis … they’re not aware of what they’re doing. That person can pose a risk for sure,” Weaver said. But “they’re much more likely to be victims of violence than perpetrators.”

Courts under fire

Bryant condemned Brown’s actions and said he’s an example of the people who fall through the cracks of a strained mental healthcare system.

Brown pleaded guilty in 2014 to two charges of felony larceny and breaking and entering. A judge suspended his sentence of five to 15 months in prison and ordered two years probation.

Four months into probation, Brown was arrested for robbing a man at an apartment. Brown pleaded guilty in February 2015 and was sentenced to a minimum of six years and one month and a maximum of eight years and four months in prison.

He was released from prison in September 2020 and spent a year on parole. It was after his release from prison that his mental health struggles came to light, his mother, Michelle Dewitt, said in an interview with The Charlotte Observer Wednesday.

Brown was “standoffish” and talked to himself every so often. Dewitt agrees with Bryant that the system failed her son.

In January, police arrested Brown for allegedly misusing 911. A police affidavit said he told officers he believed someone gave him a “man-made” material that controlled his thoughts and actions. It’s a claim he’s long made, according to his mother.

By a judge’s order, Brown was supposed to “present himself” to Alliance Health — which is contracted at the jail — to be evaluated by Aug. 4.

Brown appears to have been someone who should have been kept in a hospital, Bryant said.

Dewitt said she and her husband previously “begged” Atrium Health to take him in long-term after he started banging on the sink and walls in their home. But unless he was threatening to kill himself or others, the hospital said it wouldn’t take him, she said.

Sheriff McFadden weighs in

Brown is being held in the Mecklenburg County jail.

Sheriff Garry McFadden said his staff will work to get him some mental healthcare and any needed medications. The jail’s Restoring Individuals Safely and Effectively program offers therapy and social services, among other things.

But the jail is no hospital, McFadden said, and many others like Brown need help inside. He did not know of Brown before Zarutska’s death, the sheriff said.

Brown might have been given some temporary help before, but what’s needed is continuous, McFadden said. Too often, people are granted some brief aid before they’re thrown back out into the world, he said.

“No follow-up is done,” he said. “With no follow-up, what happens? They’re just running around on the streets.”

That is, until something like last month’s killing on the light rail.

It’s easy to see the need for more mental healthcare, McFadden said. One just needs to walk through uptown.

He recalled someone with “no top, no shoes, a pair of sweat pants” outside the Foundation for the Carolinas building, clearly in crisis, when Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson spoke in Charlotte on Sept. 4.

The justice was less than a mile away, talking to a crowd at the Carolina Theatre.

McFadden predicted there will be panel discussions about last month’s killing in Charlotte soon, complete with “talking heads” and breakout groups. Local officials will “feel good” after those discussions, he said, but nothing will have truly changed. The light rail will not be any safer, nor will Charlotte’s bus system, nor will people in Charlotte generally, he said.

Meanwhile, the violence has resonated in Washington, D.C., as President Donald Trump spoke about Brown on Monday.

“There are evil people,” Trump said. “We have to be able to handle that. If we don’t handle that, we don’t have a country.”

Zarutska’s death, and the ensuing uproar, has become political, the sheriff said.

He noted that the Trump administration usually targets immigrants. That has played out in Charlotte, where Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have made arrests outside the county courthouse, near a magnet school and in other sensitive places.

Now, McFadden said, the administration will use the death of an immigrant to its political advantage. Zarutska fled to the United States from Ukraine with her family, trying to escape Russia’s war, her family has said.

“Now, we’re going to use her tragedy as a platform — a political platform,” he said.

Rev. Dr. William J. Barber took to social media to call out the political firestorm this incident has caused and to push the focus toward the mental healthcare system.

“It was not a robbery. It was not a drug deal gone wrong,” Barber said on X on Monday. “This was a mental health crisis, and we know what’s needed to address mental health crises: good access to healthcare for all people.”

Democratic Gov. Josh Stein has also weighed in, saying the event was further proof that more law enforcement is needed.

“I call upon the legislature to pass my law enforcement recruitment and retention package to address vacancies in our state and local agencies so they can stop these horrific crimes and hold violent criminals accountable,” Stein said.

Police not solution

But Bryant and Weaver don’t believe that more police is the solution. Brown passed through courts and prisons like other people suffering mental health disorders, said Weaver, the Charlotte NAMI director.

“There’s no safety net for people when they’re released from the hospital, and there’s no viable treatment plan,” said Weaver. “Our penal system is the largest institution for mentally ill people.”

When Bryant trains rookie officers in Question, Persuade, and Refer protocol, she encourages them to take a more compassionate approach. QPR is an emergency response practice for first responders assisting people undergoing mental health crises.

Plus, she said she thinks police are overwhelmed and have too many responsibilities. Adding mental health calls to their job only makes things more difficult for everyone involved, she said.

Involving the police also breaks trust between them and people suffering from mental health struggles, Weaver said. She pointed to New York State, where first responders can involuntarily commit people suffering mental health crises to hospitals.

“Just because a police officer drops someone off … does not mean they’re going to get the care they need to get,” Weaver said. “It’s like a tiny Band-Aid on a huge wound, because the person may stay in the hospital for two to three days, get medication and then be released. And the whole cycle starts over again.”

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