A Tennessee grandmother is back home, or what’s left of it, after spending nearly six months in custody for a crime committed in a state she had never visited, all because of a botched facial recognition software match.
Angela Lipps, 50, was arrested last July at her home and extradited 1,200 miles to Fargo, North Dakota, to face charges of organized bank fraud.
The ordeal began on July 14, when U.S. Marshals arrested Lipps at gunpoint while she was babysitting four children. She was booked into a local Tennessee jail as a fugitive from justice.
Despite telling authorities she had never been to North Dakota or even traveled by airplane, she was held without bail for 108 days during extradition proceedings.
The investigation in Fargo centered on multiple bank fraud incidents from April and May 2025. Surveillance footage showed a woman using a forged U.S. Army ID to withdraw tens of thousands of dollars.
According to court documents obtained by WDAY News, Fargo detectives ran those images through facial recognition software, which flagged Lipps as a match. A detective then compared Lipps’ social media and driver’s license photos, concluding she matched the suspect’s facial features, body type, and hairstyle. Lipps stated that investigators never contacted her before filing the charges.
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“It was so scary, I can still see it in my head, over and over again,” Lipps told the outlet.
Lipps was eventually moved to North Dakota on October 30. Her court-appointed attorney, Jay Greenwood, later obtained financial records that proved she was in Tennessee at the time of the thefts. Greenwood noted that while the crimes were occurring in Fargo, Lipps was depositing Social Security checks and making small purchases for pizza and Uber Eats in her home state.
Fargo police interviewed Lipps for the first time on December 19 at the Cass County Jail. Five days later, on Christmas Eve, prosecutors dismissed all eight counts against her, including theft and unauthorized use of personal identifying information.
Upon her release, Lipps found herself stranded in Fargo during the winter.
“I had my summer clothes on, no coat, it was so cold outside,” she said. Local defense attorneys and the F5 Project, a Fargo-based nonprofit, provided her with a hotel room and transportation to get her back to Tennessee.
Although the charges were dropped, Lipps says the time behind bars cost her her home, her car, and her dog because she was unable to pay bills while incarcerated. She noted that she has received no apology from the Fargo Police Department.
Fargo police state the fraud investigation remains open, and no other arrests have been made.
“I’m just glad it’s over,” Lipps said. “I’ll never go back to North Dakota.”
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