Charlotte native and rapper DaBaby releases music video depicting light rail stabbing

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — Charlotte native and rapper DaBaby released a music video Tuesday depicting the deadly light rail stabbing on the CATS Blue Line on August 22.

The music video, for a song called “Save Me”, opens with the CATS surveillance video that showed Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska being stabbed by her alleged attacker, Decarlos Brown. The footage is paused just before the actual attack.

The description of the video reads, “A Dedication to Iryna Zarutska,” with a link to a GoFundMe for her. According to CATS officials, the video was filmed Monday night on the light rail.

MORE | No charges filed in shooting outside rapper DaBaby’s NC mansion

A few seconds later, the video cuts to DaBaby, whose real name is Jonathan Kirk, who begins to rap while riding the light rail as two actors portraying Zarutska and Brown reenact the moments before the footage ended.

DaBaby sits across from the actress playing Zarustka, identified as Natalie Jones, and the actor playing the suspect, KenDarius “Too” Hargrove. As the “suspect” moves to stab “Zarutska,” DaBaby stops him and escorts him off the train.

CATS officials tell Queen City News that they were not involved in this filming, nor did they grant them permission. As DaBaby escorts “Brown” off the light rail, real security guards are seen at the end of the video escorting them off the train.

“This filming was reported last night via the CATS See-Say Application in the CATS-Pass App at which time security responded by escorting them off the vehicle as per the video,” officials say.