Speaker 1: What's going on. Thank you so much for listening to
this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon
to three on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you
want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream,
my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron,
go to dpeakclendarshow dot com. Make sure you hit the
subscribe button. Get every episode for free right to your
smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for
your support. So you just heard in the top of
the hour news there that the North Carolina State Auditor
is launching an investigation into essentially security spending on the
Charlotte area transit system to find out how much are
they spending on security is it adequate? And Dave Bollock
is the auditor. He cited the rash of violence that's
been on the buzz and remember and the trains. But
remember like this has been going on a while, right,
I mean we talked about at the time the bus driver,
remember who was murdered, the violence against bus drivers. They
were like clamoring for more protection and safety from the
cat system. This was a couple of years ago. Remember
Tark Bakari, the former Charlotte city councilman made a big
deal about getting plexiglass bulletproof glass around the bus drivers,
and of course all of the Democrats were like, oh,
shut up, you Republican. So there's another there's another aspect
to all of this, and I mentioned it in last
hour's chat with Andrew Dunn, and it is the decision
to release the video. And this gets into journalism ethics.
I know, oxymoron, but it gets into a question that
newsrooms find themselves grappling with, and hopefully they've got people
of different opinions that are arguing for either side, and
it is whether or not local media should have released
the video from the light railcar that shows the murder.
WBTV they released it, but they paused the video before
the actual murder, but they showed all of the rest
of it and then they do a cutaway and that's
the video that went viral over the weekend, which then
prompted the national coverage. On the other hand, WSOCTV they
opted not to. So here's what Joe Bruno, reporter at WSOCTV,
who has done a lot of really good work on
this story in the last two and a half weeks,
he said, cats released the fatal stabbing video of Arena Zarutzka.
I watched it. It is horrifying. I made the call
with a small group of managers who watched the clip
to not show any video of Arena on the train.
This is out of respect to her family who may
not have seen the video. The video is graphic, disturbing
and incredibly scary. Okay, So first off, what I think
they should have done, KATS should have done, is to
provide that video to the family first and tell them
we have a Freedom of Information Act request from local media.
They want this video, It's going to be out there.
Do you want a copy of it? Before this thing
goes viral? I actually come down on this with the
WBTV handling of it. I think they handled that well.
I think they they published the whole video except for
the actual attack. They stop the video, they pause it
just as the attacker to Carlos Brown Junior, you know,
takes his arm back, rears back, and then they freeze
frame it right, that's and then it goes. It goes
from color to black and white, and so I think
that was an appropriate way to handle it. So it
doesn't show the actual murder, but it shows you everything
else around it. Almost they didn't show what happened in
the car because obviously there's a camera on the on
the the very on the victim, basically where she's sitting,
but they we don't ever see the video after he
has struck her. We just see him then in a
different part of the car, walking up and pacing around,
dripping blood. He takes his sweatshirt off, he wraps it
around his hand, which is bleeding. He's dropped, he's dripping
blood all over the floor. And here's why. At one
point in the video he can be heard mumbling, I
got that white girl. And I watched the video multiple
times and never heard him say it. It was only
after somebody on social media pointed this out. I went
back to the video and I jacked up the audio
levels and he does say it. He says, I got
that white girl. Now, he's not telling anybody except whatever
voice is in his head. And that's why releasing the
video is important because, in Joe Bruno's description, as in
all descriptions from any reporter, right, any reporter is going
to miss stuff, and they're going to focus on things
that some other reporter might not. Okay, That's why you
want more people with eyes on it, so you get
different reports on what they're seeing. And so if you
were to simply rely on a reporter who watches the
video and then describes it to you, you don't know
what you don't know, You don't know what else is
on that video. So Bruno's description was, after watching the video,
we have more context than perspective, and then he describes
the man in the red sweatshirt is to Carlos Brown.
The picture is from right before Zeruska got on board.
You can see the train was pretty full. When Zeruzka
boarded the train, she sat in the aisle seat in
the road directly in front of him. Brown was at
the window. Zarutzka wearing headphones. The two had no interaction whatsoever.
She was scrolling on her phone the entire ride. Brown
and Zerutzka were on the train together for four and
a half minutes. To Carlos, Brown showed a little to
no emotion on the ride. At times he rested his
head on the window, just as Katz said, he looked
like any other transit rider see and that also is
in my opinion, like I would report that differently because
when I was watching it, you could see him muttering
to himself. He was It wasn't like he was just
sitting there staring out the window. He was out, he's
muttering to himself, he's fidgeting around in his chair. And
so Joe and I would have a different report on
what we're witnessing. And by the way I learned this
lesson back in high school, had an English teacher who
was trying to show the difference in the way people
view things and our perspectives and stuff. And he talked
about how one couple of years prior he had had
some one of the locals, one of the students in
the school, who was a bit of a ruffian, if
you will, and he asked him to come in threaten
the teacher, mister Umstetter was his name, and threaten mister Umstetter,
and you know, complain about a bad grade or something,
and threaten him and then leave. And so the kid
comes in, he does the performance, and then he leaves,
and Umstatter then tells all of his students, please write
down what you just saw happen, and I'm going to
need it in order to file a report. And so
he has the whole class write down what they saw happen,
and everybody gave different accounts, right, and that is normal.
That's why you want more people with eyes and ears
on a situation in this matter. Bruno goes on to say,
about a minute or so before the fatal stabbing, we
notice a shift. He starts to fidget with his hand,
his eyes widen. This stood out because we knew what
was about to happen, but it wasn't necessarily something that
would seem dangerous in the moment he actually rested his
head on the glass again. Just seconds before he took
a knife out of his pocket, stood up and immediately
stabbed Zarutzka. Immediately after the stabbing, Brown slowly walks towards
the front of the train. Another man ran to tell
the light rail operator what happened and to stop. About
two minutes and five seconds after the stabbing, when the
train came to a stop at the East West station,
Brown stepped off the train. CMPD arrested him on the platform.
It should be noted there were several passengers who rushed
to Zarutzka's aim aid which, by the way, like that's
part of the video we have not seen. We saw
one man take the shirt off his back and attempt CPR.
And so that's the description offered by Joe Bruno. But
nowhere in that description does he mention the muttering of
I got that white girl. And maybe that's why Cash
Pttel announced he's the FBI director, that the FBI has
been investigating this and this may be a potential hate
crime because of those utterances. We shall say.
Speaker 2: So.
Speaker 3: When I was a kid, my grandpa died with Alzheimer's,
and before he died, my mom and my dad took
care of him as he got worse. Forty years ago,
there were no treatments and not much support for caregivers
and family. But things are different today because of the
work of so many people, including the Alzheimer's Association of
Western Carolina. It's a great organization with awesome people with
huge hearts. I've been a supporter for twenty five years.
This cause means a lot to me. I participate in
the annual Walk to End Alzheimer's and I'm leading a
Charlotte team again this year, and it's called once again
Pete's Pack. You can sign up and you can join
the team and walk with us. It's on October eighteenth
that truest Field sign up at alz dot org slash
walk and then you can search for my team name,
Pete's Pack. There's also a link at thepetepod dot com.
There's also a link in the description of this podcast. Also,
I'll be am seeing the Gastonia Walk on October eleventh,
and so you can make a team and join that
one too, or make a donation and help me hit
my goal of five thousand dollars. If you do, I
really appreciate it. There are a bunch of other walks
all over the Carolinas. You can go to alz dot
org slash walk for all the dates and locations. We're
closer than ever to stopping Alzheimer's. Can you help us
get there? Will you walk with me? For a different future,
for families, for more time for treatments. This is why
we walk.
Speaker 1: Got a message here? It's a Pete tweet from Eric
who says disgusting but predictable framing from the New York Times,
and then there is a yeah, there is a screenshot
here of the New York Times post headlined a gruesome
murder in North Carolina ignites a firestorm on the right. So, again,
as I mentioned yesterday, journalism in rule number two. Right,
when a scandal involves a Republican, the story is the scandal.
When a scandal involves a Democrat or in this case,
democrat policies, Democrat city council, Democrat governor, Democrat attorney general then,
or Democrat da Democrat judges, right, then the story isn't
the scandal. The story is the Republican reaction to the scandal.
And that's why you see words like pouncing and seizing.
That's why we joke about it all the time. It's
because it's such a rote formula for the media that
they always frame these stories as Republicans are pouncing on
the scandal or this story. Republicans are seizing on this
in order to try to make some political hey, because
Democrats never do that, right, Democrats never say, take a
school shooting and try to turn it into an argument
for gun control. That never happens. Democrats never pounce on
that story. Ever. The article Conservatives are mad about the
perceived failings of Democratic policies the perceived failings and includes
a helpful reference to a white supremacist uprising in Wilmington,
North Carolina in eighteen ninety eight, in which at least
sixty black men were killed. Yes, that was the Wilmington
Riot New York Times. And do you know who did it? Democrats?
They murdered blacks and Republicans who had won free and
fair elections to take control of the Wilmington City government.
And they were murdered by Democrats. Up into a frenzy
by the Raleigh News and Observer, who finally one hundred
years later apologized for it, for their role in it,
here's the same sort of approach I mentioned this last
Hour with Andrew Dunn as well this Axios story by
Mark Caputo at Axios, but I think he also either
worked at or maybe still does some work for Politico.
Headline stabbing video fuels magas crime message. So it's right.
It's not that it's not that the Republicans are using
this to fuel their message. It's that, dang they noticed.
How dare you conservatives, you Republicans noticing that our policies suck?
Like that's what he's mad about. He's not mad that
this deranged, repeat, repeat offender was allowed to walk the
streets after a judge said, yeah, he needs a psyche
val at the recommendation of the defendant's own defense attorney,
a public defender, who said this guy is not competent
and needs a psyche val. The judge was like, I
quite concur Yes, you're free to go. Now what now,
same judge orders a psyche val because we've got to
make sure that he's competent to stand trial for the murder,
because he can claim insanity. Now not funny how it
all works out for him. Computero's piece quote MAGA influencers
are drawing repeated attention to violent attacks to elevate the
issue of urban crime and accuse mainstream media of undercovering
shocking cases. Yes, because it's true. You did not cover
this case until the video went viral and all of
a sudden, the President of the United States of America
starts sh shocking video of the fatal August twenty second
knife attack on twenty three year old Arena Zarotzka on
a light rail car car in Charlotte, North Carolina dominated
weekend conversation on Trump friendly social media. See, so there
he is blaming what your lack of coverage on the
fact that it's being reported on quote conservative or Trump
friendly social media. So because conservatives are talking about something
that means you shouldn't. Is it news? That's the first
question you in a newsroom need to be asking about
a story that is the north Star. Is this news?
And it is news? And if you tell me that
it's newsworthy to cover the Daniel Penny New York City
subway restraining of the crazy guy Jordan Neely and then
Neely died and you gave you gave that story all
sorts of coverage. Why why, Well, here's the uncomfortable truth.
It's that Daniel Penny was white and Jordan Neely was black,
and this woman is white and the attacker is black.
That's the uncomfortable truth that media outlets don't want to
have to acknowledge because it's true. It's true. They don't
want to give any evidence to the Trump friendly social media.
They don't want to give any breathe, any oxygen to
allow this story to breathe, to let other people know
about it, because they're afraid of how it's going to
be used. Because they view themselves as protectors of some group,
some oppressed class of people. And why are they oppressed
because of the color of their skin, Because that's how
they view people is through the prism of race. That's
why they're doing this. That's why they had to be
dragged to this story. It's the same thing with the
I've made mention of the Kermit Gosnell case where they
called it a local crime story. Guy was probably the
most prolific serial killer in American history. They didn't want
to cover it. Why because abortion right, because the ideology
is harmed by acknowledging this true story. So we'll just
not cover it. Game on Week one starts now, and
every touchdown brings you closer to a payout. With Draft
Kings sports Book and official sports betting partner of the NFL,
this isn't just football, it's first touchdown fireworks anytime TD
rushes live bets that ride every momentum shift a DraftKings,
Every play is your next shot to win. Will the
Panthers win? Will we even get a touchdown? New customers
bet just five dollars and get three hundred dollars in
bonus bets instantly, plus get over two hundred dollars off
NFL Sunday ticket from YouTube and YouTube TV. So your
season starts now. Download the Draft Kings sports Book app
and use code Pete to get three hundred dollars in
bonus BT's instantly when you place your first bet of
five dollars or more plus over two hundred dollars off
NFL Sunday ticket from YouTube and YouTube TV, but you
got to use promo codepeat In partnership with DraftKings, the
Crown is yours. Gambling problem called one eight hundred gambler
In New York call eight seven seven eight hope and why,
or text hope and why four six seven three six nine.
In Connecticut, help is available for a problem gambling Call
eight eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven
or visit CCPG dot org. Play responsibly on behalf of Boothill,
casino and Resort Kansas. Fees may apply in Illinois twenty
one plus. Age and eligibility varies by jurisdiction void in Ontario.
Bonus bets expire seven days after issuance. See Sportsbook dot
DraftKings dot com, slash promos NFL Sunday Ticket offer for
new subscribers only and auto renews until canceled. Digital games
and commercial use excluded. Restrictions apply additional NFL Sunday Ticket
terms or at YouTube dot com slash Go slash NFL
Sunday tickets terms limited time offer. The White House has
just begun its press briefing, and Caroline Leavitt has started
the press conference talking about the Charlotte light rail murder.
So I went to c SPAN. Here I rolled it back.
We're going to start from the beginning of her press brief.
Speaker 2: Jujic's for my tardiness today, Thanks for being here. Another
packed room. It's good to see. We'll begin with a
scheduling update today at Yankee Stadium, and they returned to SKA.
Here are the facts that many outlets have shamefully and
intentionally failed to report until President Trump drew attention to it.
On August twenty second, Arena Zarutska was stabbed to death
on the rail system in Charlotte, North Carolina, by a
savage career criminal. This is a public transportation system that
many in the area use every single day to go
to school and work. Arena was on the train that night,
traveling home from her job at a pizzeria, still in
uniform from her shift. This beautiful, innocent, twenty three year
old young woman was a Ukrainian refugee who had recently
fled her country for a chance at a safer life
and a promising new beginning here in the United States
of America. But tragically, a public transportation system in a
major American city was more dangerous than the active war
zone that she left. The President in the entire White
House are praying for her family and friends during this
unimaginably difficult time. But while we extend our thoughts in prayers,
we must also seek justice for this crime and call
attention to this heinous incident. Surveillance video of the killing
was finally released to the public this past Friday. It
shows the alleged killer, de Carlos Brown Junior, pull out
a knife, get up from his seat behind arena, and
prepare to thrust a blade into her neck before the
released footage gets cut. This is pure evil on full display.
The most enraging and unacceptable part of this story is
that her death was entirely preventable. Carlos Brown never should
have been on that train that night. In fact, he
should have been behind bars to Carlos Brown has been
charged with crimes no fewer than fourteen times dating back
to twenty and eleven, including for armed robbery, felony, larceny,
breaking and entering in shoplifting. Brown had previously served five
years in prison for a robbery with a deadly weapon charge,
and he had also forfeited bonds three different times, twice
in twenty fourteen and once in twenty twenty three. Despite
all of this past documented criminal history, when Brown was
arrested yet again in January of this past year, a
Democrat judge, who will I will add was a supporter,
a strong supporter of former Vice President Kamala Harris, released
this insane criminal once again without requiring him to pay
any bail. He simply had to sign a written promise
to return for his court hearing. Think about how crazy
it is to ask a career criminal, someone who by
definition repeatedly breaks the law, to just sign a written
promise and come back again another day. This is madness.
This monster should have been locked up and Arena should
still be alive. But Democrat politicians, liberal judges, and weak
prosecutors would rather virtue signal than lock up criminals and
protect their communities. And, perhaps most shamefully of all, the
majority of the media. Many outlets in this room decided
that her murder was not worth reporting on originally because
it does not fit a preferred narrative. Many of the
journalists in this room spills plenty of ink trying to
smear Daniel Penny for defending a subway car from a
deranged lunatic in New York City, but none of those
same reporters lift a finger to write stories about an
actual murderer. Here's the truth that every American must know. Too.
Many innocent people across the country continue to pay the
price of the failed experiment known as cashless bail that
has been championed by the Demo Party for years. All
the way back in twenty twenty, North Carolina's then Democrat
Governor Roy Cooper established a so called Task Force for
Racial Equity and Criminal Justice. Sounds nice, but it's not.
That task force was co authored by then Attorney General
and current Democrat Governor Josh Stein. It recommended quote reimagining
public safety to quote promote diversion and other alternatives to arrest.
It also advised to de emphasize some felony crimes, prioritize
quote restorative justice, and eliminate cash bail. Democrats in North
Carolina and nationwide are consumed with pushing a woke, soft
on crime agenda. No matter how many innocent Americans suffer
as a result. Instead of aggressively prosecuting and locking up
violent criminals, the Democrat backed cashless bail approach lets these
criminals roam free in our country to offend again and again.
These reckless policies have turned too many many of American
cities into hunting grounds for career criminals who mock our
justice system, drain law enforcement resources, and recavoc on law
abiding citizens. Enough is enough, and that is why President
Trump is doing everything in his power by taking action
to undo these absurd policies. The President recently signed a
powerful executive order directing the AG to submit a list
of states in local jurisdictions with cashlest bail policies so
that the Trump administration may identify federal funds that can
are being provided to these states and can potentially be
suspended or terminated. President Trump firmly believes that to maintain
order in public safety, we must incarcerate individuals who's pending
criminal charges or criminal history demonstrate a clear ongoing risk
to civil society. This is a common sense and sensible
approach that the vast majority of Americans agree with, and
it's time for the Democrat Party to get on board
with what is right. When these criminals are caught, they
must prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and
be sent to prison where they can no longer terrorize
our streets. This is the mandate the American people delivered
to President Trump, and it's a mandate he intends to fulfill.
Staying on the topic of public safety, new preliminary data
released today by Customs and Border Protection in August shows
that President Trump has delivered the most secure border in
American history. For the fourth straight month, zero illegal aliens
were released into the United States by CBP. Nationwide encounters
are down ninety three percent below the peak of the
Biden administration. Border patrol apprehensions on the Southwest border in
the entire month of August were less than what was
apprehended in four days in August twenty twenty four under
the Biden administration. President Trump has ended disastrous Biden illegal
alien invasion. He sealed our border in record time, keeping
this central promise he made to the American public.
Speaker 1: With all right, so there's the opening statement from them
in the White House, Press Secretary Caroline Levitt, Maybe this
Charlotte murder leads to the end of this cashless bail experiment,
which has been I think an abject failure at this point.
All right, you hear me talk a lot about incentives, right, Well,
let's talk about incentive trips, the kind that companies offer
employees to fire them up and reward their teams. If
you own a business or you work somewhere that offers
these incentive trips, first off, good for you, but also
there is a custom app that's a game changer for
these trips. It's called incentive Tripkit. Private group messaging, shared photos,
your itinerary, travel details, all built into a single, easy
to use app. There's even a traveler locator so Carl
from Accounting doesn't get left behind. The best part about
incentive trip Kit it's totally private, no email captures, no
sign ups, no cringe ads. It's simple, clean and secure,
and when the trip is over, incentive trip Kit turns
those highlights into a professional storytelling video. So think about it.
When you launch next year's incentive trip campaign, that video
becomes your greatest motivator. Talk about a return on investment. Right,
You got to check out incentive trip Kit for your
business visit incentive tripkit dot Com because great trips deserve
even better returns. All right, So the press secretary there
mentioned that they are looking at potentially withholding funds from
the City of Charlotte over these cash lists bail as
well as other locations over these policies. And by the way,
I'm glad that Caroline Levitt mentioned the twenty twenty what
do they call it, the Task Force for Racial Equity
in Criminal Justice. It was done by Roy Cooper and
leading the charge was Josh Stein, then Attorney General now
our governor, as well as Anita Earls, who is on
our Supreme Court. And I actually I went back and
pulled my old copy of the of the executive summary.
I have it here. We'll go over some of the
things that they've been doing over the last five years,
see how they've turned out. We'll do that in the
next hour. But let me get back to the withholding
of money. The dot Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy threatened to
withhold federal funding from Charlotte over the stabbing on the
light rail line. The FBI director acknowledged that it's been
investigating the case from day one. Duffy told Sean Hannity. Quote,
Your federal tax dollars go to fund a lot of
these transit systems across the country, and we have to
look at them and say, well, maybe it's appropriate that
we start pulling some of that money back, because I
don't think the American taxpayer wants to pay for the
homelessness and criminal element that harm twenty three year old
girls like this who are going home from work. Right,
What are we funding? Right? What are we funding this from?
I mentioned this at the beginning of the hour as well.
The North Carolina State Auditor Dave Bullock says that he's
launching an investigation to focus on public safety aspects of CATS,
including but not limited to, private security contracts, metrics and
data used by cats, and private security for public safety purposes,
and the cat's safety and security budget. Quote. One of
the most basic duties a government owes the people is
public safety. The recent lawlessness and violence that have taken
place on Charlotte's public transportation raised serious questions about the
security measures in place. We will investigate CATS and examine
its public safety contracts and operations. Charlotte has faced a
string of violent incidents recently on public transportation in March,
a sixty four year old veteran was attacked on a
Cat's bus, and according to his family, he became paralyzed
from the neck down as a result of that attack.
Months later, in August, a fifty seven year old veteran
was hospitalized after being attacked by multiple people on a
cat's bus, and then just days after that, a repeat
offender previously in prison for robbery with the deadly weapons,
stabbed and killed a woman on Charlotte's light rail. He
concludes the press release saying Charlotte Mayor Vye Lyles, the
Metropolitan Transit Commission leadership, and CATS leadership have been notified
of our investigation, which will begin immediately. Additionally, the State
Auditor's special report on the City of Charlotte's payment to
the chief of the Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department will be
released this week. Remember that one, So we're getting an
update on that one this week. It's a banner week
in Charlotte. All right, that'll do it for this episode.
Thank you so much for listening. I could not do
the show without your support and the support of the
businesses that advertise on the podcast, So if you'd like,
please support them too and tell them you heard it here.
You can also become a patron at my patreon page
or go to the epclenarshow dot com. Again, thank you
so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.