North Carolina's largest police union endorsed Republican Senate candidate Michael Whatley this week, citing a revolving-door justice system that keeps putting violent repeat offenders back on the street — and ordinary Americans are paying the price in blood.
The endorsement lands one year after Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska, 23, was stabbed to death on a Charlotte light-rail train by Decarlos Brown Jr., who attacked her from behind with a knife. Brown, 34, has since been found incompetent to stand trial in both his state and federal cases. Her killing prompted North Carolina lawmakers to pass Iryna's Law, which tightened bail rules and increased oversight of defendants deemed a public-safety risk — but the problem extends well beyond one statute.
North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police 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. "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 pointed to the arrest of Charlotte's Di-Quan Schafar Hunt as a case study in systemic failure. Hunt, 32, had been arrested at least nine times since 2023. His rap sheet includes a December 2025 case with charges of assault with a deadly weapon, communicating threats, second-degree trespass, and two counts of carrying a concealed weapon. Records also show a September 2025 simple assault charge, a March 2025 charge of assault on a female, and 2024 arrests for violating 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.
Hunt's latest arrest came after he allegedly recorded himself punching a woman on a Charlotte sidewalk on July 30 and posted the video to social media. The woman suffered serious injuries.
"You can't hug your way out of crime," Effler said. "You have to hold people accountable."
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 August 1 delivery.
The pattern is clear: police are making arrests, but prosecutors and judges are failing to keep dangerous offenders behind bars. Nine arrests in two years for one man isn't a policing problem — it's an accountability vacuum. Iryna's Law was a start, but laws only work when the people sworn to enforce them actually do it.
The question North Carolinians face in November is whether electing one senator can fix a system that keeps opening the door for criminals to walk back out — or whether the rot runs deeper than any single race.
