North Carolina House Speaker Destin Hall (R-Caldwell) presides over session on June 25, 2025. (Photo by Galen Bacharier/NC Newsline)
North Carolina lawmakers have passed a wide-ranging crime bill, making changes to pre-trial release requirements and paving a new path to resume the death penalty in a Republican-led package that sparked fierce partisan disagreements.
The House approved the bill Tuesday, sending it to Gov. Josh Stein’s desk less than 48 hours after it was made public. Titled “Iryna’s Law,” it comes weeks after Ukrainian Iryna Zarutska was fatally stabbed on Charlotte light rail.
GOP leaders, who hold majorities in both chambers, tout the legislation as a key step in cracking down on violent crime and repeat offenders, while laying the groundwork to resume the state’s death penalty.
“Iryna Zarutska’s murder is a tragic reminder of what’s at stake,” Speaker Destin Hall (R-Caldwell) said. “That’s why we are delivering some of the strongest tough-on-crime reforms in North Carolina history.”
Democrats argue the bill would not have prevented Zarutska’s death. They have decried a lack of investment into mental health treatment and public defenders. And late changes to the bill’s death penalty language prompted several Democratic senators to walk out ahead of a vote Monday night.
“We have to address the root issues,” said Rep. Terry Brown (D-Mecklenburg). “And that takes hard work, deliberation and thoughtfulness. We must stop puffing our chests out … and using inflammatory language, and be serious.”
The bill limits pre-trial release options for defendants accused of “violent offenses,” and funnels repeat offenders toward involuntary commitment at mental hospitals.
It also ramps up judicial scrutiny of court magistrates, while streamlining the death penalty process and pursuing new methods of execution.
House Bill 307 passed the House on Tuesday, 82-30, after hours of tense and emotional debate. The Senate vote Monday was 28-8, with a majority of Democrats walking out of the vote.
Stein has not yet said whether he will sign or veto the bill. He has said he supports several key provisions, but has not weighed in on changes it makes to the death penalty.
Leaders agree on importance of mental health, but remain far apart on solutions
Mental health services and treatment remain critical to the state’s criminal justice system, Republicans acknowledge.
Sen. Danny Britt (R-Hoke) said there was “more work to do” on the matter. And Iryna’s Law would send more repeat offenders directly to hospitals for mental health evaluations. The man charged with murdering Zarutska, Decarlos Brown, Jr., reportedly had untreated schizophrenia.
But GOP leaders were reluctant to allocate money on mental health in the bill, shooting down amendments to spend millions on training magistrates and law enforcement.
“It’s not my understanding that the reason he was failed is because there wasn’t resources to get him an evaluation,” Senate President Phil Berger (R-Rockingham) told reporters Monday night. “He was failed because his mother wanted somebody to pick him up, and there was not the willingness on the part of the system to do that.”
Brown was previously admitted to a mental hospital for two weeks, The Charlotte Observer reported in an interview with his mother, and received medication. But they did not take him in long-term, and he stopped taking the medication.
Asked how the legislature could legislate the “willingness” he referenced, Berger responded: “You hope that you have people in positions that are making those kinds of decisions, that understand the consequences of failure to act. And if you don’t … then we need to get other people in there.”
Senate Democratic Leader Sydney Batch (D-Wake) fumed after the vote Monday night that Republicans were unwilling to spend more money. The bill failed to address “our broken mental health system” and “underfunded and overtaxed law enforcement,” Batch said. A representative of the state’s ACLU chapter has called the bill’s approach to involuntary commitment “a road to nowhere.”
“We just don’t want to pay for it,” said Rep. Laura Budd (D-Mecklenburg) during House debate on Tuesday. “We want to punish our way out of it.”
Rep. Carla Cunningham (D-Mecklenburg) said Monday she had dealt with the involuntary commitment process first-hand, with her teenage son.
“This ain’t going to solve it,” Cunningham said. “This ain’t going to fix it.”
Could NC begin using electric chair or firing squad?
In its original form, Iryna’s Law made some procedural changes to North Carolina’s death penalty process. Defendants’ appeals would be governed by stricter rules, and cases involving capital punishment would proceed in their own counties, rather than just Wake County.
But an amendment tacked on mid-debate on the Senate floor by Republicans expanded those changes.
Now, the bill would require the state to adopt another method of execution if lethal injection — currently the state’s default method — is found to be unconstitutional.
Executions have been on pause in North Carolina for almost 20 years, tied up by legal and regulatory challenges. The bill’s new language means that when the courts do eventually rule on the practice, the Department of Adult Corrections would adopt another method used by another state. That could include the electric chair or a firing squad.
There are 122 offenders on North Carolina’s death row with a case dating back to 1985.
Berger told reporters he believed there were opponents to the death penalty that were seeking “so many roadblocks that it’s never going to be implemented.”
“Other states have been able to untie those kinds of situations,” he said. “And it’s our belief that these measures should help us move forward in those cases where folks have exhausted all their appeals, and judgment has been rendered.”
U.S. Rep. Tim Moore (NC-14) highlighted the murder of Iryna Zarutska on Charlotte’s light rail in a speech on the U.S. House floor. (C-SPAN)
Rep. Sarah Stevens (R-Surry) defended the capital punishment process during debate Tuesday, saying those on death row “are getting a fair trial because they have experts in the death penalty” — referring to capital defenders.
Berger’s changes came as a surprise to Democrats. Several had planned to support the bill, but said they couldn’t vote for it as amended.
“The General Assembly should not be using the death of this young lady to sanction state-sponsored murder of individuals who are on death row,” said Sen. Mujtaba Mohammed (D-Mecklenburg), who has met with Zarutska’s family.
When the bill came up for a final vote on Monday night, a group of Senate Democrats walked out of the chamber.
“Until they decide to stop being petulant children, we don’t have to continue to participate in their nonsense,” said Batch, the Democratic leader.
North Carolina House Democratic Leader Robert Reives (D-Chatham) speaks to reporters on June 26, 2025. (Photo by Galen Bacharier/NC Newsline)
The changes saw similar blowback across the building, where House Democratic Leader Robert Reives (D-Chatham) called the final product “cynical” and “mean.”
“The battle may be done, the war isn’t,” Reives said. “But I really, really wish we had done this different.”
Violent crime rates have decreased
Available data shows that violent crime rates have decreased, both in North Carolina and nationally, over recent years.
The rate of violent incidents in North Carolina dropped 1% from 2019 to 2024, according to the Council of State Governments Justice Center’s analysis of FBI data.
That’s one of 39 states in which violent crime decreased during that period; 11 other states saw violent crime increase.
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