What is Iryna’s Law? All about new North Carolina legislation named after murdered Ukrainian refugee

North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein (D) signed into law on Friday, September 3, new criminal justice legislation in honor of Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska, who was fatally stabbed by 34-year-old Decarlos Brown Jr. on a Charlotte light rail train. House Bill 307, also known as Iryna’s Law, was overwhelmingly approved by the Tar Heel State’s Legislature, where Republicans hold the majority in both chambers, per The Hill.

Community members hold candles as they gather for a vigil honoring the life of Iryna Zarutska, who was fatally stabbed on a commuter train last month, Monday, Sept. 22, 2025, in Charlotte, N.C. (AP Photo/Nell Redmond)(AP)

What is Iryna’s Law?

The new law will remove prior barriers that barred executions, thus lowering hurdles for the death penalty in North Carolina. It will also demand the swift review of death penalty appeals filed within two years. The legislative text says that any appeal or motion filed more than two years ago needs to be scheduled for hearing by December 2026. The hearing has to take place by December 2027.

The law will ensure that certain violent offenders are denied cashless bail, and will limit judges’ authority over pretrial release while requiring more defendants to undergo mental health evaluations. In case a defen­dant charged with a vio­lent offense was invol­un­tar­i­ly com­mit­ted with­in the past three years, the evaluations could become manda­to­ry.

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Brown, a schizophrenic homeless man with a prison record, was let go free on cashless bail. Brown, who has now been charged with first-degree murder, was arrested several times in the past since 2011 for felony larceny, robbery with a dangerous weapon, and communicating threats. He served five years in prison for the robbery with a deadly weapon charge.

More about the new law

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, “HB 307 impos­es stricter pre­tri­al release con­di­tions, requires invol­un­tary men­tal health eval­u­a­tions for defen­dants under cer­tain cir­cum­stances, short­ens the time­line for cap­i­tal case appeals, and pro­vides an alter­na­tive to the cur­rent method of exe­cu­tion — lethal injec­tion. North Carolina last car­ried out an exe­cu­tion in 2006. Legislators say the leg­is­la­tion is a response to the death of Iryna Zarutska, who was killed on Charlotte, North Carolina’s pub­lic tran­sit sys­tem in August 2025.”

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Changes to North Carolina’s death penal­ty sys­tem are among the most important provisions of the bill. The Death Penalty Information Center says, “The leg­is­la­tion estab­lish­es strict time­lines for pend­ing appeals and motions in cap­i­tal cas­es, requir­ing any fil­ing more than 24 months old to be sched­uled for a hear­ing by December 2026, and no lat­er than December 2027. This expe­dit­ed time­line would require North Carolina courts to hear and decide near­ly all of the state’s more than 120 death row cas­es in the next two years, a feat that risks wrong­ful exe­cu­tions in a state where 12 peo­ple have been exon­er­at­ed from death row since 1972. In direct response to Ms. Zarutska’s death, HB 307 adds a new aggra­vat­ing fac­tor that allows pros­e­cu­tors to seek the death penal­ty when a cap­i­tal felony is com­mit­ted against some­one on public transportation.”

The legislation even changed the state’s avail­able meth­ods of exe­cu­tion. The Death Penalty Information Center that says HB 307 “includes lan­guage that removes the pro­hi­bi­tion against elec­tro­cu­tion and lethal gas, while retain­ing lethal injec­tion as the pri­ma­ry method of exe­cu­tion.”

The website adds, “If lethal injec­tion is deemed uncon­sti­tu­tion­al, the new bill adds pro­vi­sions that allow the use of any exe­cu­tion method approved by anoth­er state, so long as the U.S. Supreme Court has not declared the method to be uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. The U.S. Supreme Court has nev­er found a method of exe­cu­tion to be unconstitutional.”

Brown, a career criminal, ambushed and stabbed Zarutska to death on a Charlotte light rail train. The 23-year-old woman had fled her war-torn home to seek safety in the United States.