Before becoming a nurse, Kandice Robinson aspired to become a police officer in Minnesota. But the Black woman changed her mind after witnessing what she described as blatant racism in the American criminal justice system.
That racism, she said, nearly got her killed in 2018 after moving to North Carolina when an off-duty police officer and his wife held her at gunpoint as she drove through a residential neighborhood looking for a patient’s home.
‘“Don’t move! We’re going to shoot you in the head!’” Robinson said in an exclusive interview with Atlanta Black Star, describing what the cop, later described as Matthews Police Officer Nick Helms, told her.
“‘We’re going to shoot you in the face!’”
Robinson said she told Helms and his wife, Samantha, that she was a nurse trying to find a patient’s home. They did not believe her even though she was wearing nursing scrubs.
Helms lived in Mint Hill, a neighboring suburban town outside his Matthews jurisdiction. The couple allowed Robinson to leave after about 15 minutes, but the encounter traumatized her.
Robinson said authorities never arrested or disciplined Helms in connection with the incident.
Tyler Ross, a Black man hired by the Matthews Police Department in 2022 and fired in 2025, is now urging the Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s Office to review whether Helms should face a felony kidnapping charge. Ross says the department fired him after he complained about racial harassment.
Robinson’s encounter occurred in 2018. North Carolina generally has no statute of limitations for felony prosecutions, meaning the passage of time would not prevent prosecutors from pursuing a felony charge.
“The fact that she was held at gunpoint in her car, not free to go, that’s a felony,” Ross said in a telephone interview with Atlanta Black Star.
“That’s called kidnapping in North Carolina.”
Ross, who grew up in Westchester County, New York, said the racial harassment began when he joined the Matthews Police Department.
“I dealt with racial disrespect in reference to an FTO [field training officer], telling me my Black a– deserves a military beatdown for how I walked into a roll call as if I owned the place,” Ross said.
“I also had to deal with the fact that I wasn’t able to get lateral promotions that other white officers were able to get, and their excuse was that I didn’t have enough jurisdiction.”
Ross said supervisors also denied him DWI training for more than two years while newly hired white officers received the training.
The Matthews Police Department fired Ross in January 2025 for what it described as “policy violations and officer safety,” he said. The termination stemmed from a hotel trespassing call, in which Ross allowed a man with an outstanding warrant to leave in an Uber.
“I had no reason to ID him,” Ross said. “They accused me of letting a fugitive go, which is not true because legally I had no reason to keep him longer than what was reasonable to finish investigating.”
Ross said law enforcement agencies across the region rejected his applications after his firing, leaving him unemployed for several months. He later joined Allied Universal; a security services company.
Ross said he filed a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which is investigating his termination.
Ross said he learned about Robinson’s case after the department fired him. The incident angered him, he said, because the department fired him over alleged policy violations while Helms continued to receive promotions despite Robinson’s allegations. Helms is now a sergeant.
After learning about Robinson’s case, Ross contacted the Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s Office to ask why authorities never charged Helms.
“Recently, I recorded a conversation with myself and the Mecklenburg County Assistant D.A. Bruce Lillie, who said that he couldn’t prove intent, which is the reason why they didn’t prosecute,” Ross said.
“But for the statute, kidnapping means if you are any way not free to go, can’t move or held at any type of gunpoint, which justifies kidnapping,” Ross said. “It doesn’t matter what the intent is.”
North Carolina’s kidnapping statute requires prosecutors to show that someone unlawfully confined, restrained or removed another person without consent for an enumerated purpose, which can include terrorizing the victim.
Ross disputed the DA’s alleged assessment that prosecutors could not prove intent.
“So based on that conversation, it showed me that they were really trying to cover for this,” Ross said.
Ross also accused the Mint Hill Police Department of failing to conduct a thorough investigation, never presenting the case to the district attorney’s office.
“From that situation that happened, there was no real investigation,” Ross said. “The names were not released.”
Ross referred to a local WJZY report that said Mint Hill police would not release Helms’ name because authorities had not charged him with a crime.
A Mint Hill police report obtained by Ross redacted the officer’s name and portions of the narrative describing the incident.
He also said a Mint Hill police lieutenant told him investigators, “didn’t have enough to prosecute.”
The DA also told Robinson that it was just a “simple mistake” by Helms and his wife.
“Well, simple mistake comes ends with apology,” she said.
On Nov. 23, 2018, the day after Thanksgiving, Kandice Robinson drove through Helms’ neighborhood in Mint Hill, a Charlotte-area suburb near Matthews.
She worked for a nursing company and had an overnight shift scheduled at the home of an elderly man who lived in the neighborhood.
“That was my first time going to that client that night,” Robinson said in an exclusive interview with Atlanta Black Star.
Robinson said she saw an elderly woman outside a house and asked for directions. The woman, whom Robinson later learned was Helms’ grandmother, pointed down the street.
Robinson said she then asked whether she could use the woman’s driveway to turn her car around. The woman agreed and went back inside.
But as Robinson turned around, Helms and his wife came outside with guns, she said. They threatened to kill her.
“They both had their guns pointed in my face, were like, ‘What are you doing here so late at night?’” Robinson said.
“I’m doing nursing. I have a client. I was looking for the address, and I asked the lady to help me find the address,” she told them.
Robinson said Helms replied, “I don’t believe you”, while still pointing a gun at her face. She said Samantha Helms then went inside to speak with the grandmother.
“If you move one more time, I’m going to shoot you in your face,” Robinson said Helms told her after she looked in her rearview mirror toward the front porch. She said he ordered her to keep both hands on the steering wheel.
“I was just moving my eyes, trying to see what’s going on,” she said. “He looked really evil.”
Robinson said Helms’ wife came back outside after speaking to the grandmother.
“She’s telling the truth, put your gun down,” Robinson recalled her saying.
“He refused to do it. He had his gun inside of my car, inside of the window, and he moved it closer when his wife left.”
“And she yelled at him about four times to put the gun down, that I was telling the truth, but he gave me a look that he was going to pull the trigger, then come up with some silly excuse,” she continued.
Robinson said the couple eventually let her leave. When she arrived at her patient’s home, she said she was too distraught to work.
“When I got to my client’s house, I was in so much fear,” she said. “And I was trembling and shaking. The patient’s wife had to care for me that whole night.”
Mint Hill police told local media in 2018 that officers responded to a report of a suspicious vehicle and spoke with Robinson, Helms and his wife, but they denied the allegations.
Police made no arrests and did not release Helms’ name because authorities had not charged him with a crime.
Ross began looking into the incident this year, Robinson said, and she then learned Helms’ name for the first time.
“They didn’t handle it like a real investigation,” she said. “It was very hard for me to sleep for years.”
