CHICKENSH$T DA FINALLY Brings Charges Against Natasha Lopez, Ignores The Law!

Hinzugefügt: 2026-05-23

[00:00:00]We have a big update in the Natasha Lopez case. The state, after nearly a year, has finally decided to actually bring charges based on the encounter that occurred on her front porch and her standing in the doorway and demanding a warrant before she allowed the worst cop in Georgia to come rifle through her house. And we've got the documents, so let's talk about it.

[00:00:32]What's up you guys? Welcome back to Southern Draw Law. My name is James White, criminal defense attorney, former prosecutor, former police officer. So, I stay in somewhat regular communication with Natasha. She keeps me updated and she also does that on her own social media. So, you can find Natasha's Facebook page in the description of this video. And she routinely posts updates about not just her case, but about other situations that are going on in Cherokee County because this case has sort of propelled her into an activism that she probably didn't even see coming. And so now she's sort of in media in a different way than she was before. She was like a lifestyle coach and that kind of thing. and now she's in media because of the fact that she's been victimized over and over again by the Cherokee County government. Not just the sheriff's department. That's where it started, but then onto the schools and all that. And we're going to cover all that, right? But before we go too much further, I need to remind you about my partnership with Chapter. If you're on Medicare or you're about to be on Medicare, I need you guys to listen up.

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[00:03:08]Now, let's get back to the video.

[00:03:11]If you don't remember what happened, which at this point millions and millions of people have been familiarized with Natasha Lopez, but if you don't remember, essentially what happened was Natasha has a son named Joseph Christopher Helms who was alleged to have run from the police on a motorcycle. The police, not being very good at having to investigate things and do them the right way, wanted to cut corners on the investigation. They went to the place where he worked, tried to pressure him into talking. They tried to pressure his bosses into talking. They tried to pressure his girlfriend into talking. And they tried to pressure Natasha into talking. And then they showed up at her house. They wanted to look for this motorcycle. They helped themselves into her garage. They helped themselves onto her porch. And keep in mind, none of this was as a part of a active pursuit. this pursuit, this running from the law as it were or whatever happened, they still have not created a nexus really through lawfully obtained evidence to even prove that Mr. Helms did what they're accusing him of doing. Nevertheless, at the time that Natasha Lopez was presented with police officers coming to her porch doing an investigation, it was days later. It was not active. It was not a hot pursuit. there were no exigent circumstances and we walk through all of the cases that essentially say in order to go onto somebody's porch when you've not been invited or when it's been made clear to you that they are not interested in a voluntary consensual encounter, you need a warrant unless you have certain things going on. And none of those things were present at the time that Aaron Mills, the 2x4 headed piece of deputy, and remember we've covered multiple cases with Mills. He's It's not just this case where he's sloppy and does whatever he wants. He just had his case heard by the post commission on this particular incident.

[00:05:14]And it's just amazing about the timing because the post commission chose to take no action which is disgraceful because his conduct was unconstitutional. There's no question about it. But it's just amazing that after Mills's case got put before the post commission and the post commission chose, at least in this instance, to take no action on him, magically, remember this incident happened back at the end of August of last year around the Labor Day weekend where she was arrested. magically they've decided to get off their hands and actually make a formal accusation because I've told you guys this before, but when a police officer arrests somebody and presents them to the criminal justice system, it's really no more than a suggestion, right? It's okay, I arrested these people because I believe I have probable cause of A, B, C, or D. But that still gets presented to the prosecutor as a suggestion of the charges. And then once the prosecutor decides we're either going to move forward or we're not going to move forward, that law enforcement officer is converted to nothing more than a witness. Okay. So after Mills's case makes it past the post commission and they have not chosen to take away his law enforcement license, which will not remain intact very much longer because he's not going to stop until somebody holds him accountable in whatever way that happens. He won't stop violating rights. Magically, the prosecutor has just found a way to prioritize actually bringing formal accusation against Natasha Lopez. So, we have the documents. We're going to walk through them. All right. So, let's walk through the formal accusation from the state of Georgia. Count one.

[00:06:55]Todd Hayes, solicitor general of Cherokee County, in the name and on behalf of the citizens of the state of Georgia, do hereby charge and accuse Natasha Lee Lopez of a misdemeanor. And here's the offense. obstruction of an officer by knowingly and willfully obstructing Deputy Charles Mills, a law enforcement officer, in the lawful discharge of his official duties by failing to follow his lawful commands to remain on the porch during an active investigation in violation of OCGA 1610248, contrary to the laws of the state. And then a second count for the exact same offense, but this time it was not because she didn't stay on the porch. it was failing to follow his lawful commands to exit a residence after Mills told her to get out of her own house so he could search it. And I think there's just an important opportunity here to talk about the limitations of an investigation. You know, police officers are free to investigate up to certain points, right? You know, it's kind of like um let's say you're in you're at the county fair, okay? And you hear a popular music group playing music.

[00:08:03]You're free to listen to that, to observe all of the music, and you can get so far, however far you want to get until you get to the point where there's a gate that blocks off any further access for you to observe this any closer. That's the way investigations work. And the gates that you can't pass as an investigator are there when you reach the point where your investigation crosses into circumstances protected by the Fourth Amendment. And in this particular case, let's say that, you know, Aaron Mills observed the music of Natasha's song because we all know of the siren that Natasha Lopez is. And let's say that he observed the music of Natasha's song. He heard her kid was a turd who ran from the police. He heard her kid used to, you know, enable the stealing of snacks from a concession stand at a football game. Whatever, whatever the situation was, he thought her kid was a bad kid. And mostly his ego was bruised. So he's free to investigate. He's free to go to Publix.

[00:09:04]He's free to go to Papa John's. He's free to go to the shopping centers. He's free to go wherever. The problem is once you get to a place where you're on somebody's property and you're in the curtilage of their home, your investigation is getting ready to cross into what the courts consider to be a search. You're allowed to investigate up to the point to where you're searching.

[00:09:24]And you cannot search without either a warrant or certain exceptions to the warrant requirement. And so yes, you do you can obstruct an investigation, but you still have to be able to show that the law enforcement officer conducting the investigation was in the course of his lawful duties. And that's what makes this so bad on this accusation because the prosecutor Todd Hayes knows that there are dishonest things that he put in the accusation and all of the things that are wrapped in this bubble of lawful orders and conducting lawful activities by Corporal Mills are dishonest because the ways that he was conducting the investigation were not lawful based on tons of case law. I just wanted to point that out. You can investigate all you want. The problem that these guys run into, and by these guys, I mean police officers who don't want to do their job the right way, is that they don't want to adhere to constitutional boundaries. They think that their investigation is a ticket to get them in into any show they want to go to. And that's not how it works. If that were the case, then you wouldn't have to get warrants. If you had everything you need, you wouldn't need a warrant. You know, if they wanted to know where Christopher Helms was on the certain night of this, they didn't need a cell phone. All they needed was a cell phone number and they had the ability to get that without violating Natasha's rights. They could have just reached out to the company that he had his cell phone with and said, "Hey, we want the metadata for where he was." And all they would have had to do in order to get a search warrant for the phone itself was to show that the metadata proved that he was in the area that he needed to be in in order to have committed this crime.

[00:11:04]Either way, none of that would have created a nexus for them to come get his phone. In order to get this phone from Natasha's residence, one, they had to know what evidence might be present. And they would have had to do that through a proper investigation, not an unconstitutional one. And then they would have used what they uncovered in the proper investigation to get a search warrant for Natasha's residence because then they can show yes the metadata also not only tells us that he was at this date at this time. So he was in the area where this pursuit happened, but also the metadata shows us that that phone is now at Natasha's house where it was.

[00:11:40]Then they needed a search warrant to go in there and search Natasha's house for the phone. And then they would have needed a separate search warrant for the device itself to find out what was on it. And all Natasha was asking for was the warrant that would have authorized their entry into their home. And they just believe that the fact that they are wearing a badge and a gun and they are cops. That means that they have a ticket to visit any part of any investigation they want to constitutional gates be damned. And that's why we're here. Okay.

[00:12:10]And I just want to say to you guys, Natasha Lopez's case was the first time ever on this channel that I put up a GoFundMe page and I said if you are if it's on your heart to donate, this is the time. Okay? But you guys raised like something like 12 or $13,000. With that money, she hired a lawyer named Christopher McCormack. And we're going to read the motion to dismiss or what they call a demur, a special demur in Georgia. It's it's almost like a hybrid between like a what we call a bill of particulars in Tennessee, which is like, okay, you said these things about my client, but you need to tell me the specific things, right? A bill of particulars has different meaning, but essentially you want to know particular facts about the things that you're accusing somebody in a bill of particulars. Well, there's sort of the same idea here and we'll notice. But what we're going to do is we're just going to walk through and then I might expand a little bit on the stuff that he mentions in his argument, but you're going to love this guy just in his persuasive writing to the court about Natasha Lopez. So, now that we've read the formal accusations, let's go through and read his motion to the court so you can see what your money helped buy for Natasha Lopez. Defendant special demur and motion to dismiss. She specially demurs to the state's May 14, 2026 accusation in the above sound cases, moves to dismiss the case and charges and shows as follows. Honor about 30 August 25, an unlawful detention was made of defendant followed by an unlawful entry into defendant's residence and arrest of defendant without a warrant and without sufficient probable cause which nevertheless the scope was exceeded even assuming arguendo which means for the sake of the argument that probable cause existed when it did not. As the arresting and investigating officers has no legal or justifiable factual basis to prolong such detention, much less to make an unlawful entry in defendant's residence, including hovering on her porch, and then to arrest the defendant, the manner conducted, and for the time frame conducted under the circumstances. The arresting officer violated the defendants's rights under the fourth and 14th amendments in the United States Constitution as well as article 1 section 1 paragraph 13 of the constitution of the state of Georgia as well as other laws and no exceptions to the search or arrest warrant are applicable to the circumstance of this case. Defendant posits that defendant was arrested, charged, and has now been formally and vaguely and strategically charged in the time frame as charged by the state for improper and for unlawful purposes and out of retaliation and vindictiveness. You very rarely, just as an aside, guys, find an attorney with the balls to say things like this in motions. It can really put the judge on edge. But this is a case that we know is complete And it's been a coordinated effort by seemingly the entire county of Cherokee County because of the fact that she dared to push back on unlawful authority. And so, you know, he's aggravated. He's aggravated over the fact that it took eight months. And it's just conveniently timed right after the post board decided that they're not going to do anything to Mills for his policing tactics.

[00:15:24]pretty convenient that now they're ready to move forward because they weren't sure they were going to have a witness with a certification anymore to move forward on and that was the issue.

[00:15:33]Nonetheless, over eight months later on May 14th, 2026, the state filed its accusation with witness list in this case see exhibit A vaguely accusing defendant of committing two crimes of obstruction of an officer in violation of 161024A.

[00:15:50]Moreover, the vague language as set forth in the provided charging document does not provide descriptions as necessary to apprise the defendant of the elements of any crime, much less two violations. And this is where I said it was going to be sort of akin to like a bill of particulars where you're saying, I need the state to answer me and tell me what particular actions she took that obstructed his ability to investigate.

[00:16:13]And and in so doing, they're going to have to explain how his investigation was lawful in the first place, and they won't be able to do it. Okay, so that's the issue. Or if they they they're going to try because any prosecutor that was operating ethically would have never brought these cases in the first place, which opened them up now to malicious prosecution lawsuit, which is happily going to be pushed through, I'm certain, by Natasha when she sues these people, and also a board complaint because it's prosecutorial misconduct. This prosecutor, Todd Hayes, knows that there's no probable cause for this case.

[00:16:43]if he can't look at this case and know that based on any examination of applicable law that Mills's approach to try to get into this house to get a phone that he didn't even know existed about a pursuit that happened two days earlier with no nexus between the motorcycle or helms or anything. There was nothing that connected her home to any evidence that he was aware of that would have been necessary for him to investigate anything. This was all a retaliation for her saying, "No, we are not going to wave our Fourth Amendment rights simply because you think you're investigating and that entitles you to do anything you want." That's what this is all about. And Todd Hayes knows that there is a prosecutotorial misconduct where you proceed with a case that lacks probable cause and you do so intentionally. If this case was something that needed to be prosecuted, it would have been prosecuted long before. I mean, whether or not Mills has a certification should have no bearing on whether or not probable cause existed to make this arrest. So why eight months? It's obvious that it all of this has accumulated and they were waiting to find out whether his certification would be taken. So now 8 months later, it's almost like exactly the same as what Mills did. Well, now 2 days later when your ego's bruised because this kid allegedly outran you on a motorcycle.

[00:18:10]Well, now there's an urgent investigation taking place. Something that just must be dealt with. And and I need you to treat it as urgently as I've treated it. Right. Two days later, he still can't get it off his ego. Still can't deal with the fact that he got burned in a police car. So, he's got to take it out on these people. And because they dared to push back, he couldn't handle it. Same thing here.

[00:18:31]They know this case is as weak as water, they know that there's nothing they can do to prove this beyond a reasonable doubt. And yet with the same sense of urgency that Mills decided to break into Natasha Lopez's house, they bring this formal accusation eight months later when conveniently just barely Mills got past the post commission without them revoking his certification. Wait till they find out what happens in the depositions. Then I wonder if they'll revisit the certification conversation.

[00:18:59]Who knows? Let's continue. Relatedly, no language is provided to establish or even inform that the officer was acting lawfully in the discharge of his official duties pursuant to OCGA161025.

[00:19:12]Furthermore, nothing is provided to indicate or describe that or how the officer had probable cause or even articulable suspicion, much less reasonably to believe that a law had been violated or was about to be violated by defendant or anyone such that the officer's act of detaining and questioning the defendant.

[00:19:32]Presumptively, if the officer was trying to detain and or question the defendant or anyone else, as the accusation is silent in defendant's own home, nonetheless, including the curdilage thereof, without her consent and without a warrant, was nothing more than a police citizen encounter and outside of the scope of the officer's police duties. 161024A requires the state establish men's ray, which is the mental state intent. the actis rees that would be the act the physical act that combined the intent with the physical act in order to carry out the crime and the means of obstruction. However, the accusation does not apprise the defendant of either as the charging document does not apprise the following.

[00:20:16]For example, how the defendant's obstruction was made in either count, much less how it was knowing and willful. What investigation was occurring on August 30th, 2025? and how and if the defendant was aware of the officer's status, how such investigation was actually active and still occurring on August 30th, cuz remember it was 2 days later when defendant was alleged to have committed two violations of 161024A.

[00:20:45]How and why such active investigation was occurring on August 30th, 2025th, specifically at the porch and/or at a residence or anywhere near the same location involving the defendant.

[00:20:57]Because you have to remember this was a motorcycle pursuit case that happened somewhere else days earlier and there was no nexus created between any of the evidence of this alleged crime and Natasha Lopez's house. E. Identification of the actual location such as the address and identification of the owner thereof, particularly on the porch andor within a residence. F. a description as to why defendant was required or how it was even necessary for defendant as to not otherwise obstruct an officer to remain on a porch presumably her own porch while also somehow at the same time or any other time requiring defendant to exit a residence presumptively her own residence. What if any arrest by the actual warrant or by warrantless arrest if any permitted basis existed was in progress or had occurred and against whom? Therefore, the defendant presents this special demur as to ascertain with certainty before commencement of trial and while she awaits production of the state's discovery sufficient notice as to the nature of the crimes she has been alleged to have committed and the allegations as to the required elements of each charge and count pinning against her so that she can plan her defense accordingly. Regardless, the case should be dismissed. And that is Christopher Lee McCormack, a badass in the Atlanta metro area as a lawyer. So, you know, apparently the district attorney for Cherokee County is looking around and saying, "Oh, well, look, uh, Sonia Allen and Fawnie Willis, well, they do whatever the they want, so I guess I'll just do whatever I want, too."

[00:22:35]Well, here's the problem. between Mahindra Patel and Natasha Lopez and Fonnie Willis's indiscretions as it were, the entire landscape of Atlanta based Georgia prosecution is about to be flipped on its head because you cannot do the things that they are doing and get by with it, especially when you got public attention. Then the next thing that he does is, and we won't walk through it word for word, but there's an entire list of these witnesses that the state has listed in exhibit A for the accusation. And on it is the psychologist who violated every ethical duty she possibly could and violated the very spirit of caring for people with disabilities when she took information gathered during an IEP meeting with a child, Natasha's son, and weaponized that and became a Karen and decided to report that to Mills. Okay, they've listed her. We did a video about that.

[00:23:37]She'll likely be a named defendant in one of the lawsuits that are going to follow this. But we did a video about it. We walked through it. We looked at all the facts and circumstances around that case. But that was after this incident on her porch. They've never charged Natasha with being an accessory to any crime. They didn't charge her with hiding any evidence. They didn't charge her with obstructing the actual investigation of this crime. They charged her with obstructing an officer because she wouldn't stand on her porch.

[00:24:09]So, the only witnesses necessary for this particular accusation will be people who were there or directly involved in this scene. Well, that obviously doesn't include Karen Wixon.

[00:24:21]And so, they've listed all these people because they want her to be intimidated into thinking that the entire county is against her. But I hate to tell you guys, she knew that all of you were against her and coming after her when she decided to push back in the first place. She's not afraid of you.

[00:24:37]And ultimately, she will prevail because she's going to sue and win. And all that this Todd Hayes has done is to make sure that they are viable defendants when she goes suing for malicious prosecution.

[00:24:50]It's bread and butter prosecutorial misconduct. There's no probable cause here. You know, it's one thing to to look at a case and be like, you know, Mills, uh you know, I understand why you feel this way, but this is a weak case.

[00:25:01]We'll try to prosecute the kid on the motorcycle to the best of our ability, but look, I can't move forward on this.

[00:25:08]That's your job as a prosecutor, but no, you all band together. Y'all violate constitutional rights collectively, and that means that you deserve to be jointly liable for the damages that you cause. So, that's the update on Natasha.

[00:25:23]As it goes further along, we will update you and let you know what exactly happens. But, I would encourage you to head over again. Natasha's Facebook page is going to be listed in the description as well as her YouTube. Head over, watch her updates. She's starting to do some activism work. She's coupled with Mick Mattel to try to do some activism work together. They're going to make a change, meaningful change in the state of Georgia. So there I don't think there's any chance in the world that she loses this case, but you never know.

[00:25:52]People were corrupt. I hope they see through this BS and I hope that the prosecutor is forced to come off of this accusation. But as we learn more, I will certainly update you. Anyway, thanks for taking the time to check it out. I'd like to invite you to check us out on all the socials. I'll put up a QR code here for you to scan with your phone.

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