CHARLOTTE — Riders were outraged after the Charlotte train where Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska was slaughtered had no additional security presence on Tuesday — a day after the city’s Democratic mayor promised an “immediate” increase in patrols in response to the shocking murder.

“If you’re going to be a person of your word, do it right there and then,” Antwan Whiting, 37, a mover and security guard told The Post while waiting for his train at East/West Boulevard — the same station where Zarutska was stabbed and bled out in front of horrified riders.

“I think she’s a crock of s–t. She’s a full of s–t person. She just wants to stay in office to look good.”

Zarutska, 23, was stabbed to death on a Lynx Blue Line train Aug. 22 by Decarlos Brown Jr., 34, a deranged vagrant with a history of violence and mental illness who was free on cashless bail after his latest arrest, cops said.

Though the story caused barely a blip for weeks, shocking newly released video propelled the case to national attention — just as Charlotte voters headed to the polls for Tuesday’s primary election to decide whether to give Mayor Vi Lyles a shot at a record fifth term in office.

Just weeks after an initial statement to a local TV reporter in which the four-term incumbent seemed to portray Brown as a victim of the system, Lyles issued a stunning reversal Monday night — pledging Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS) security and cops would be “re-deployed for a stronger presence” on Blue Line train platforms “effective immediately.”

But no such presence was spotted as The Post rode the train Tuesday morning, including at the East/West Boulevard Station, and where Zarutska boarded the train after her shift at Zepeddie’s Pizzeria.

“It’s completely unacceptable, and the mayor should step down or be fired. The mayor is just as much a part of the young lady from Ukraine’s murder as the murderer,” retired paratrooper Jerome Almon, 60, said at the Charlotte Transportation Center Station.

He also lambasted Lyles for “making excuses for a 14-time arrested criminal,” in a reference to Brown’s lengthy rap sheet.

“I grew up in Detroit during its worst era. I can just tell you as a paratrooper and an individual who spent a year on the war on the frontline, I am more afraid of being on this platform at night than I am walking the streets of Detroit at its worst period of time,” he said.

“There should be protection. There is no protection. Look right now. Show me a guard. Show me a police officer. There is no one here.” 

A single Charlotte-Mecklenburg police car was spied parked outside the station, but nowhere near close enough to respond should another attack like last month’s deadly stabbing take place on the train or platform.

After riding the Blue Line to the last of its 26 stops, a security guard who had been on the train from the beginning said he was on the same route he always works, and hadn’t even heard about Lyles promising more guards would be deployed.

The only security spotted by The Post while riding at least half of the route were three guards walking on the train platform at Bland Avenue Station, and another pair at the 7th Street Station, who checked a few emergency boxes then walked away.

Rider Sue Withee, 60, said she saw no security whatsoever on her commute, and questioned why the safety of the station is being outsourced to a private security firm.

“I don’t understand why it can’t be city police,” she said.

Mayor Lyles didn’t respond to The Post’s request for comment Tuesday as she conducted last-minute campaigning for her re-election bid.

According to The Assembly NC, the Democrat was likely set to “cruise” to a fifth term, despite two primary challengers who have hit out at the mayor for her tone-deaf statement shifting blame for the murder away from Brown.

Jaraun “Gemini” Boyd, one of two Democrats hoping to unseat Lyles, told WCNC Charlotte that the mayor’s words “reflect a failure of leadership to address the realities of mental illness in our community.”

Delter Kenny Guin III, the other Democrat vying for Lyles’ job, called Zarutska’s murder “a senseless and preventable crime,” promising to implement a zero-tolerance policy for repeat offenders if elected.

“This killer had a clear history as a career criminal that should have been a red flag to any judge and had he been ineligible for parole and no bail for repeat violent offenders, he would have already been in a facility and off the streets,” Guin wrote in a statement.