FARGO, N.D. (KFGO) – A Fargo defense attorney who works as a public defender calls it “unjust.”

Jay Greenwood says he was appointed to represent 60-year-old Angela Lipps of Tennessee who Fargo police identified as a suspect in an ongoing bank fraud investigation last fall. Greenwood says Lipps, who has no ties to Fargo and had never been to North Dakota, was classified as a suspect in the investigation based on artificial intelligence facial recognition taken from video surveillance.

Greenwood says “they put out a warrant for her arrest based on facial recognition, the Fargo Police Department, doing some kind of cross checking through Facebook, looked to see if she kind of looked the same as the lady in this video and then it kind of ended at that, you know the facial recognition software was used to identify her, they went with it, got a warrant for her arrest and then held her in jail in Tennessee for four months and then she was here (Fargo) for a couple.”

Using Lipps’ bank records, Greenwood says he was able prove that Lipps should have never been considered a suspect in the fraud investigation.

Greenwood says Fargo police eventually interviewed Lipps, the case was dismissed within a few days and she was released from the Cass County Jail. He says F5 Project founder Adam Martin drove Lipps to Chicago last Christmas where she was met by family. F5 Project provides housing and other assistance to people released from jail and prison.