North Carolina police union backs Whatley amid repeat offender crisis

A year after Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska was stabbed to death on a Charlotte light-rail train, a string of violent attacks involving people with extensive arrest records has kept North Carolina’s public-safety debate in the spotlight.

The one year milestone falls as the North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police (NCFOP) endorsed Republican U.S. Senate candidate Michael Whatley, citing concerns about repeat offenders, bail policies and support for law enforcement.

Zarutska, 23, was sitting aboard Charlotte’s Lynx Blue Line on Aug. 22, 2025, when authorities said Decarlos Brown Jr. pulled a knife and stabbed her three times from behind before leaving the train.

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Brown, 34, has been found incompetent to stand trial in both his state and federal cases.

Zarutska’s killing helped prompt North Carolina’s Iryna’s Law, which tightened bail rules and increased oversight of defendants considered a risk to public safety.

NCFOP President Chet Effler told Fox News Digital the union’s roughly 6,000 members backed Whatley over concerns about repeat offenders, bail policies and support for law enforcement.

Booking photo of Decarlos Dejuan Brown Jr., taken Sept. 14, 2022, following his arrest in Mecklenburg County. Brown, 34, is now charged in the Aug. 22, 2025, stabbing death of Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska aboard a Charlotte light-rail train. (Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO))

“We have lost accountability in this country,” Effler said. “There’s no reason to be soft on crime whenever you have victims who are going to be victims of those crimes for years to come.”

Effler also pointed to the arrest of Charlotte man Di-Quan Schafar Hunt as an example of what he described as a recurring failure to hold repeat offenders accountable.

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Hunt, 32, had been arrested on charges at least nine times since 2023, records show. Charlotte-Mecklenburg police said they arrested him after officers responding to an attempt-to-locate call were shown a social-media account containing videos detectives had already been investigating.

Diquan Schafer Hunt (pictured) has been arrested nine times since 2023, according to the Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office. (Streeter Lecka/Getty Images; Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office)

Police said one video was tied to a July 30 assault in which Hunt allegedly punched a woman on a Charlotte sidewalk before fleeing. The woman suffered serious but non-life-threatening injuries, authorities said.

Hunt’s record includes a December 2025 case involving charges of assault with a deadly weapon, communicating threats, second-degree trespass and two counts of carrying a concealed weapon. The booking record does not describe the underlying allegations or identify an alleged victim.

Records also list a September 2025 simple assault charge and a March 2025 charge of assault on a female. In 2024, Hunt was arrested in cases involving alleged violations of a domestic-violence protective order, breaking or entering and injury to personal property. He is a felon with at least six additional misdemeanor convictions in Mecklenburg County.

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“You can’t hug your way out of crime,” Effler said. “You have to hold people accountable.”

Brown’s case and Hunt’s arrest are among several recent North Carolina crimes that have sharpened the debate over repeat offenders, bail and law enforcement resources.

Stanley Shockley, 44, was arrested for beating North Carolina mom Christen Phillips with a bat, deputies say. It happened while she was reportedly delivering her DoorDash orders. (Onslow County Sheriff’s Office; GoFundMe)

In Jacksonville, DoorDash driver and mother of three Christen Phillips suffered skull fractures, brain bleeds and a fractured cheekbone after authorities said a man followed her and attacked her with a bat during an Aug. 1 delivery.

The Onslow County Sheriff’s Office said Phillips had honked at another driver while stopped at an intersection. Authorities said the driver, identified as 44-year-old Stanley Shockley, followed Phillips to a delivery stop and allegedly attacked her as she returned to her car.

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Phillips was able to drive herself to a hospital after the attack. Shockley was charged with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury.

Asheville, North Carolina, downtown district with pedestrian walking crossing, street scene. (Jeffrey Greenberg/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

The public-safety concerns have also reached western North Carolina, where Asheville officials have described a series of deadly incidents involving young people as retaliatory violence but have resisted calling the activity gang-related.

Effler criticized that approach, arguing that officials must be candid about the nature of violent crime before they can address it.

“A criminal gang is a gang, I don’t care how old they are,” Effler said. “You have to address it.”

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In Charlotte, another repeat offender, 29-year-old David Simpson, was charged with killing a man hours after his release on bond, renewing scrutiny of pretrial-release decisions.

Effler said people with repeated arrests for violent or assault-related offenses should not be allowed to cycle through the justice system without meaningful consequences.

North Carolina has also faced deadly shootings recently, outside its larger cities. In Winston-Salem, two people were killed and several others were wounded after what police said was a planned fight between juveniles that escalated into a shooting near a middle school.

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Authorities said multiple people exchanged gunfire at Leinbach Park, near Jefferson Middle School. Some of those involved were juveniles, police said.

The shooting was not at the school, the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation said, but it underscored concerns over violent disputes that law-enforcement groups say have spread into communities across the state.

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Michael Whatley speaks as North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police President Chet Effler, right, looks on during an endorsement event in Wilmington, N.C., on Aug. 12, 2026. (North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police)

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Effler said the cases involve different defendants and circumstances but reflect the same broader failure to hold dangerous offenders accountable before more people are harmed.

Effler also accused former Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper, Whatley’s opponent in the U.S. Senate race, of supporting cashless bail as governor.

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RNC Chair Michael Whatley announces his run for Senator for North Carolina on July 31st, 2025 in Gastonia, N.C. (Paul Steinhauser/Fox News)

“Cashless bail puts people on the streets that will arbitrarily walk up, like this Charlotte case and women getting assaulted and getting a video done,” Effler said. “You cannot allow a criminal to not be held accountable.”

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A Cooper campaign spokesperson disputed Effler’s claim, telling Fox News Digital the former governor “oppos[ed] cashless bail while signing stricter bail laws and putting rapists and violent criminals behind bars.”

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The campaign cited Cooper’s signing of the Pretrial Integrity Act, which tightened bail requirements for certain violent offenses and repeat defendants. It also said it returned the NCFOP’s endorsement questionnaire on Aug. 10, disputing Effler’s statement that the union had not received a response.

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In a news release announcing the endorsement, Whatley said he was “honored” to receive the NCFOP’s backing and pledged to support law enforcement if elected.

“Roy Cooper has the blood of 25 innocent victims on his hands. Cooper put the lives of North Carolinians in danger when he released 4,200 violent criminals from prison early, the majority of which went on to commit other crimes including murder, rape, and violent felonies,” Whatley campaign spokesman DJ Griffin told Fox News Digital. “Now, the top law enforcement organizations in NC have all endorsed Michael Whatley over a former Attorney General. Law enforcement knows who will have their back and will work to keep North Carolina communities safe, while Cooper will stand with violent criminals and illegal aliens over our communities and brave first responders.”

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Then-Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat from North Carolina, speaks with reporters on Sept. 10, 2024 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Paul Steinhauser – Fox News)

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Effler said Whatley has committed to back the Protect and Serve Act, the HALO Act and other measures the union believes would provide officers with greater protection and resources.

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“Michael Whatley has committed to the things that we believe in,” Effler said. “He’ll support actions that doesn’t defund law enforcement from doing the professional job that we need to do.”

Fox News Digital’s Sarah Rumpf-Whitten and Kelsie Cairns contributed to this report.