A North Dakota woman’s quiet text message to her employer turned into an early-morning police rescue after she said her ex-boyfriend had been holding her hostage inside her Fargo home.
The case was covered by Deep Dive BodyCam in a recent video, which used bodycam footage and narration to show how officers arrived before sunrise, found the woman at the door, and detained 39-year-old Anthony Peterson while he was asleep on a couch.
According to the host, the woman texted her boss just after 5 a.m. to say she could not come to work. It was not because she was sick or running late. She said she had been kidnapped.
That one message, sent while Peterson was allegedly asleep, brought four officers to her door.
The Text That Started The Rescue
The bodycam footage begins with officers at the residence, where the woman quickly tells them that Peterson has two guns.
“He has two guns,” she tells officers, according to the footage, before identifying him as Anthony Peterson.
An officer asks whether Peterson is asleep and where the guns are. The woman explains that he had started acting erratically after drinking and said he “just got wild.”
She also tells police that Peterson did not live there and had shown up a couple of days earlier.
According to the video description, Fargo police said the woman had texted her employer that she had been kidnapped by her ex-boyfriend and would not be able to come to work. Her employer then contacted authorities, and officers were sent to the home.
That detail is one of the most chilling parts of the case. She did not call 911 loudly or run into the street. She waited for a tiny opening, used the safest message she could, and trusted that someone on the outside would understand it was real.
In situations like this, the smallest ordinary routine can become a lifeline. A missed shift, a strange message, a boss who pays attention – those things can matter more than anyone realizes in the moment.
Officers Find Peterson Asleep Inside
When officers enter the home, they find Peterson asleep and begin giving loud commands.
“Fargo Police,” officers yell in the footage. “Go on your face.”
Peterson responds calmly, repeatedly saying, “Yes, sir,” as officers order him to put his hands behind his back.
Once he is handcuffed, Peterson asks, “What did I do now?”
The Deep Dive BodyCam host points out that the footage is unusual because Peterson appears calm and cooperative once police arrive. He sounds confused and polite, even asking officers to explain what is happening.
But, as the host notes, the answer to Peterson’s question is being given only a few feet away by the woman who says she lived through the situation.
“The version she describes has nothing in common with the man on camera,” the host says in the narration.
That contrast is one of the strongest parts of the footage. It shows how bodycam video can capture two very different realities at the same time: the calm man in handcuffs and the frightened woman explaining what happened before anyone else got there.
The Woman Describes Threats And Violence
While officers speak with the woman, she says Peterson had become angry because he believed she had cheated on him.
She tells police he had threatened not only her, but also her friends.
According to the footage, the woman says Peterson told her he knew how to hurt her “in the worst place possible” and have others killed so she would have to live with it.
An officer asks whether Peterson hit her. She says yes, telling police he hit her in the side and threw things at her.
When the officer asks where she was struck, the woman points to her side. The officer notes that it looks like she may have a small bruise.
The woman also says she had asked Peterson to leave.
She explains that he took her phone, but she later managed to grab it while he was asleep. That was when she texted her coworker or boss for help.
“I just told him that my abuser [was holding] me hostage,” she tells the officer in the footage, adding that she told the person not to text back because she did not want Peterson to see it.
That is a terrifying kind of planning. She was not only trying to get help, but also trying to make sure the help did not accidentally put her in more danger before police arrived.
She Says A Gun Was Pressed To Her Head
The woman tells officers that Peterson had hit her in the face a couple of times and punched her in the side.
She says she was in the shower when things suddenly escalated, and she did not understand why he began acting that way.
According to the footage, she says Peterson had shown up after getting out of jail and that they were not really together anymore.
She later describes an earlier incident in which Peterson allegedly became angry because she did not come home when she said she would. She says her boss had needed her to stay later, and that made Peterson angry.
The woman tells police that officers had once come out before, but she had to tell them to go away because Peterson allegedly had a gun on her.
“He was like, ‘They can’t make it to you fast enough,’” she says in the bodycam footage.
She then describes Peterson allegedly unloading a gun, pressing it to her head, and pulling the trigger.
When an officer asks what Peterson was saying during that incident, she says he claimed he was ready to die.
It is hard to hear that part and not think about how close this case may have come to ending differently. The host’s point about the “quiet before it” feels important here, because the most dangerous moments in domestic violence cases often happen before the public record begins.
Peterson Denies The Guns Are His
After Peterson is detained, officers ask whether he is allowed to carry or possess guns.
“I don’t have any guns,” Peterson says in the footage.
An officer then asks why there were two guns next to him.
Peterson replies that it is her place and says the guns are not his. When asked whether fingerprints would be found on the weapons, he again denies ownership.
The woman, however, tells officers the firearms are Peterson’s, though she says he had wanted her to claim they were hers.
“They’re his, but I’m supposed to say they’re mine,” she says in the footage.
She also tells police that Peterson was on probation and was not supposed to have anything.
According to the Deep Dive BodyCam host, Peterson was legally barred from possessing a firearm, and the weapon found beside him on the couch was reported stolen.
The video description says Peterson was charged with unlawful possession of a firearm and terrorizing with a dangerous weapon. It also notes that Fargo police said he was facing allegations connected to stolen property and felonious restraint, though court and jail records cited in the description did not show charges for all of those offenses at the time.
A Past Record Comes Into Focus
The host identifies Peterson as a 39-year-old man from Lakeville, Minnesota, and says he was arrested that morning on four alleged offenses: unlawful possession of a firearm, felonious restraint, terrorizing with a dangerous weapon, and possession of stolen property.
The video description says Peterson had several convictions in Minnesota between 2003 and 2023, including violations of a protection order, stalking, and domestic assault.
Deep Dive BodyCam’s narrator says this history matters because the case was not about someone who had never been told by a court to stay away from another person.
“He’d been told repeatedly by the courts,” the host says, adding that the woman who texted her boss was living with the result of how little those orders changed.
That is a hard but important observation. Court orders can be vital, and they can give police a way to act, but a piece of paper cannot physically stop a person in the middle of the night. The gap between legal protection and actual safety is where many victims are forced to survive minute by minute.
Peterson’s public defender told authorities he expected Peterson to plead not guilty, according to the video description.
A Calm Arrest Does Not Erase The Allegations
One of the final points made by the Deep Dive BodyCam host is that Peterson’s calm behavior in front of officers does not decide what happened before they arrived.
In the footage, Peterson says “yes, sir,” cooperates with commands, asks to use the restroom, and appears confused about why he is being arrested.
The host says that composure is not the same as innocence.
That is a sharp way to describe what makes the footage so unsettling. Police videos often show the moment after danger has paused, not the hours or days before it. A person can look calm once the room is full of officers, while the person beside them is still trying to explain how they made it out alive.
The woman in this case did not escape by force, according to the host. She escaped by waiting until Peterson fell asleep and sending one careful message to a person who noticed she was missing.
By the time officers arrived, that message had already done what it needed to do.
It had turned a private threat into a public emergency.
A former park ranger and wildlife conservationist, Lisa’s passion for survival started with her deep connection to nature. Raised on a small farm in northern Wisconsin, she learned how to grow her own food, raise livestock, and live off the land. Lisa is our dedicated Second Amendment news writer and also focuses on homesteading, natural remedies, and survival strategies. Lisa aims to help others live more sustainably and prepare for the unexpected.
