Fargo Police admit to errors in Angela Lipps investigation, implement new AI policy

Fargo Police Chief Dave Zibolski gives update on Angela Lipps investigation on Tuesday, March 24, 2026

FARGO (KFGO) – The Fargo Police Department is admitting to mistakes made in the Angela Lipps investigation.

The Tennessee woman was jailed for nearly six months related to a Fargo bank fraud case, but charges were later dropped and she was released from custody.

At a news conference on Tuesday, Police Chief Dave Zibolski apologized to the public and emphasized the importance of transparency.

“How important public trust is to us in our department and in our profession. We’re happy to acknowledge when we make errors and we’ve made a few in this case for sure,” Zibolski said. “Also that we are willing to address those and we’ve taken immediate action in all of these cases. And we certainly apologize for any effect or adverse effect that this has had on trust in our community because we want people to be confident in what we’re doing.”

One person from New Jersey is already in custody related to the case, but Chief Zibolski says the scheme is much larger than they originally thought.

“This is a pretty organized criminal enterprise in which they have folks who are training people, it appears to be almost all women, into how to do these fraudulent bank home equity line schemes in which they try to withdraw or transfer large amounts of funds, often trying to stay under that $10,000 mark to avoid federal reporting,” Zibolski explains.

The Fargo Police Department typically uses the North Dakota State and Local Intelligence Center, or NDSLIC, to handle cases that involve artificial intelligence. But in this case, the West Fargo Police Department’s facial recognition system is what identified Lipps as a potential suspect.

Chief Zibolski says Fargo Police investigators wrongly assumed that their surveillance photos were also submitted to the NDSLIC, but they were not.

All Fargo Police Department personnel, and possibly some with the Cass County State’s Attorney’s Office, will receive in-depth training on investigating and prosecuting cases involving artificial intelligence.

“There were steps that we overlooked. It still went to the State’s Attorney’s Office and was reviewed, but again, I think this is a big training issue from that perspective because there could have been other steps maybe that if it was reviewed under this new process, the supervisor or unit commander would have said ‘let’s maybe try a, b and c before we ever take it to the State’s Attorney’s Office,’” Zibolski explained.

Fargo Police directive on use of facial recognition technology

The Fargo Police Department is updating policies and procedures related to investigating crimes involving AI. Zibolski issued an immediate temporary directive regarding the use of facial recognition technology, outlining the new parameters.

Fargo Police detectives are also banned from using West Fargo’s facial recognition technology in their investigations. Zibolski says his department will only go through NDSLIC or similar federal intelligence centers.

The department is doing an internal review, but Zibolski says it’s possible there may be no disciplinary action.

“There doesn’t appear, in anything that I’ve found so far, to be any malicious or intentional conduct. I think it’s maybe a lack of knowledge or maybe an oversight in just covering all the bases, what they should have done to make sure that we’ve got even more than we thought we should have had,” said Zibolski.

Fargo Mayor Tim Mahoney speaks at news conference on Angela Lipps investigation on Tuesday, March 24, 2026.

Mayor Tim Mahoney says they will continue to adapt processes to make sure it’s done right going forward.

“When chief found some errors that were made in this area where we got our facial recognition and how that worked, we immediately addressed it. I think people have to understand that as we go through this case, we have to finish it. We’re not done with it yet,” said Mahoney.

Zibolski also cites a communication gap between his department and Cass County when people are booked into the jail.

They are working with the Cass County Sheriff’s Office to come up with a formal notification process when a person with a warrant related to a Fargo case is booked into the Cass County Jail.

Zibolski says if they would have been notified, they could have resolved the situation with Lipps sooner.

Following Tuesday’s news conference, Dane DeKrey and Eric Rice, attorneys for Angela Lipps, issued the following statement:

“Today’s news conference confirms what we have seen in our own investigation. It appears that the Fargo Police Department did not undertake basic investigative efforts before causing a warrant and charges to issue for Angela Lipps. Officers knew that Angela was a Tennessee resident, and we have seen no investigation by officers to determine whether she traveled to or was in North Dakota at the time of the bank thefts. Instead, an officer used AI facial recognition as a shortcut for basic investigation, resulting in an innocent woman being detained and transported halfway across the country to answer for charges that she had nothing to do with. We appreciate that the department appears to be making efforts to correct these issues in the future. But this recognition and correction would never have happened if Angela had not stepped forward. We continue our investigation to ensure that all wrongdoing is examined and accounted for. We will continue our efforts until Angela is fully cleared of suspicion and actions that led to her being charged are corrected.”

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