{"id":3328,"date":"2025-10-05T12:53:03","date_gmt":"2025-10-05T12:53:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/todaynews11.online\/?p=3328"},"modified":"2025-10-05T12:53:03","modified_gmt":"2025-10-05T12:53:03","slug":"exclusive-iryna-zarutskas-best-friend-reveals-heartbreaking-final-text-but-phone-data-uncovers-mysterious-post-attack-call-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/todaynews11.online\/?p=3328","title":{"rendered":"EXCLUSIVE: Iryna Zarutska\u2019s Best Friend Reveals Heartbreaking Final Text \u2013 But Phone Data Uncovers Mysterious Post-Attack Call"},"content":{"rendered":"

In an exclusive interview with this outlet, Sofia Kowalski, the best friend and coworker of slain Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska, has broken her silence, sharing the devastating final text message Zarutska sent just moments before her brutal stabbing on a Charlotte light rail train. The six simple words \u2013 \u201cShift\u2019s over, I\u2019m going home\u201d \u2013 now serve as a haunting epitaph for the 23-year-old\u2019s unfulfilled American Dream. But in a startling twist, newly analyzed phone data obtained by investigators reveals an additional, mysterious call made from Zarutska\u2019s device after the attack, raising questions about what \u2013 or who \u2013 might have been involved in her final moments.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Kowalski, 24, who worked alongside Zarutska at Zepeddie\u2019s Pizzeria in Charlotte\u2019s South End neighborhood, tearfully recounted the evening of August 22, 2025, during an emotional phone call from her apartment. \u201cIryna and I finished our shift together around 9:30 p.m. She was excited because she\u2019d just bought her first used car and was practicing for her driver\u2019s license test,\u201d Kowalski said, her voice cracking. \u201cShe texted me right after clocking out: \u2018Shift\u2019s over, I\u2019m going home.\u2019 It was so typical of her \u2013 always positive, always looking forward. I replied with a heart emoji and told her to text me when she got back safe. She never did.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zarutska, who fled Ukraine\u2019s war-torn Kyiv region in August 2022 with her mother, sister, and brother, had embraced life in North Carolina with remarkable resilience. An accomplished artist with a degree in Art and Restoration from Synergy College in Kyiv, she volunteered at local senior centers, cared for neighbors\u2019 pets, and dreamed of becoming a veterinary assistant. \u201cShe was the kindest soul,\u201d Kowalski added. \u201cShe\u2019d sketch animals during breaks and give them away as gifts. Iryna loved America \u2013 she called it her \u2018new canvas.\u2019 Who could have imagined it would end like this?\u201d<\/p>\n

Surveillance footage from the Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS) captures the tragedy unfolding. At approximately 9:46 p.m., Zarutska boarded the Lynx Blue Line at Scaleybark station, dressed in her pizzeria uniform \u2013 khaki pants and a dark shirt \u2013 with her long blonde hair tucked under a hat. Earbuds in, she sat scrolling on her phone in an aisle seat, directly in front of 34-year-old Decarlos Dejuan Brown Jr., who was in a window seat wearing an orange sweatshirt. Four minutes later, without any apparent interaction, Brown pulled a pocketknife from his hoodie and stabbed Zarutska three times, including a fatal wound to her neck. She slumped in her seat, clutching her throat as blood pooled on the floor. Brown then calmly walked to the other end of the car, removed his hoodie, and exited at the East\/West Boulevard station, where he was arrested minutes later.<\/p>\n

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The attack, captured in graphic detail on CATS cameras, has sparked national outrage and political firestorms. Brown, a Charlotte native with 14 prior arrests spanning 12 years \u2013 including armed robbery, felony larceny, breaking and entering, and assault \u2013 had been released from jail just weeks earlier on a minor charge. Court records indicate a history of mental health issues, including schizophrenia, and he was homeless at the time. Federal prosecutors charged him on September 9 with committing an act causing death on a mass transportation system, a crime eligible for the death penalty. A judge ordered a 60-day psychiatric evaluation, but Brown\u2019s family insists the system failed him, with his sister Tracey noting in a recorded jail call that he had previously called 911 claiming \u201csatellites in his brain.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zarutska\u2019s boyfriend, Stas Nikulytsia, also a Ukrainian immigrant, confirmed to media outlets that she had texted him similarly that night, saying she was en route home \u2013 a message echoing the one to Kowalski. When she didn\u2019t arrive, Nikulytsia and family friends tracked her phone to the station, only to learn she had been pronounced dead at the scene. \u201cShe was head over heels for the American Dream,\u201d her uncle told People magazine in an exclusive, recounting how Zarutska had recently moved in with Nikulytsia and was taking English classes at Rowan-Cabarrus Community College. The family opted to bury her in North Carolina rather than repatriate her body to Ukraine, a poignant symbol of her adopted home.<\/p>\n

But the exclusive revelation from Kowalski about the \u201cgoing home\u201d text has been overshadowed by emerging phone data analyzed by the FBI as part of the federal probe. Sources familiar with the investigation, speaking on condition of anonymity, disclose that Zarutska\u2019s phone \u2013 recovered from the scene with a significant amount of blood \u2013 shows an outgoing call placed at 9:58 p.m., just three minutes after the stabbing was reported at 9:55 p.m. The call lasted 12 seconds and connected to an unidentified number traced to a burner phone in the Charlotte area. No voice was recorded due to the brevity, but the timing suggests it occurred while Zarutska was still alive, though gravely injured and possibly unconscious.<\/p>\n

What makes this call \u201cmysterious,\u201d investigators say, is that it doesn\u2019t match any known contacts in Zarutska\u2019s recent call log. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t to her boyfriend, her family, or Sofia,\u201d one source explained. \u201cThe phone was in her hand when responders arrived, and the screen was still active. We\u2019re not ruling out accidental dialing, but the precision \u2013 thumbprint unlock and speed dial? \u2013 raises eyebrows.\u201d Speculation online, fueled by X posts and conspiracy threads, ranges from a final desperate plea for help to something more sinister, like involvement from an unknown party. Kowalski, upon hearing of the call, was stunned: \u201cIryna wouldn\u2019t call a stranger. If she was hurt, she\u2019d call me or Stas. This doesn\u2019t make sense \u2013 it\u2019s like a ghost in the machine.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The redacted details in court filings echo the family\u2019s earlier handwritten letter, which contained a blacked-out passage hinting at \u201cdeeper vulnerabilities.\u201d Zarutska\u2019s family, through attorney Lauren O. Newton, has demanded full transparency: \u201cWe are heartbroken beyond words. Iryna came here for peace and safety, not this horror.\u201d They\u2019ve also pleaded for an end to the circulation of the graphic video, emphasizing dignity over sensationalism.<\/p>\n

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