Former Becker County Sheriff's deputy running to replace the man who fired him

(FOX 9) - Less than a year after being terminated by Becker County Sheriff Todd D. Glander, former deputy Chad Peterson is running to replace him.

Whether he wins or not, Peterson's story and the unorthodox path he took to running for office speak to the challenges and tensions in law enforcement today around accountability, mental health, community relations and officer well-being. 

The body camera footage of the 2021 incident that led to his termination was released Wednesday morning by a local public safety-focused YouTube channel. The video, published by SafetyMN and shared with FOX 9, shows Peterson getting into an obscenity-laced, threatening argument with a resident during an early morning call on June 7, 2021. 

Becker County Sheriff Todd Glander placed Peterson on administrative leave the same day the incident occurred, and internal affairs began an investigation, records show. Six months later, in December, Glander fired Peterson for conduct unbecoming of an officer and for violating several department and POST board policies.

The termination letter read in part: 

"On or about June 7, 2021, while responding to a civil complaint, you engaged in numerous and continued use of obscene, profane, and indecent language towards the complainant, engaged in and continued an unnecessary verbal altercation, were discourteous and disrespectful to the complainant and threatened to fight with and/or cause harm to complainant. This conduct occurred while you were on-duty and in uniform."

Peterson challenged his termination, acknowledging he was in the wrong but arguing the punishment should have been more lenient. On July 1, a state-appointed arbitrator sided with the sheriff’s office and ruled the firing was justified.

The arbitrator's report includes a summary of the incident in the video.

The resident, a man in his 20s, had called 911 because he wanted law enforcement to be present while he evicted a man who was staying with him. Peterson and the man got into a heated phone conversation earlier that night when Peterson told the man he needed a court order to evict someone staying at his home. The man responded by saying, "You f-----s don’t do anything" and said he would go home and "Beat the s--t" out of the person staying in his home.

The video shows Peterson arriving to find the man throwing things out of the house. He looks through the backyard and the home to see if anyone is hurt and then returns to talk to the man in the house. At that point, the report says Peterson was agitated because he had other work to do, and the man was agitated because Peterson was going through the home.

The two quickly get into a verbal altercation that lasts three minutes. Peterson leaves and walks toward his squad car, but then turns around, walks back to the man and says "Do you want to go?" to which the man says "No." The exchange continues for a few more moments before Peterson turns back to his car and leaves.

Peterson told FOX 9 has had time to come to terms with what happened in the video.

"That's not me. That's not my career or that doesn't dictate what I did in my career. I have done lots of good things in my career. I have served my community well. And, you know, that incident, those couple of minutes, my behavior is embarrassing. Does not reflect me. And it's something I have to deal with and move on from it," he said. 

He adds he never intended to fight the man, despite saying, "Do you want to go?" 

"That was jaw-jacking. It was just me running my mouth," he says.

Peterson wishes he could speak to the man directly. "With that young man that I yelled at, I'd like to apologize to him, but I don't know how to go about it because he made a reference that he doesn't care to see me ever again. But I would, you know, I'd like to extend my hand out and shake his hand and apologize." 

Reached for comment, Sheriff Glander declined an interview but issued the following statement:  

"The Becker County Sheriff’s Office mission statement provides that we will serve the citizens with "exceptional law enforcement services free from prejudice or favor, with quality leadership, integrity and respect. As the elected Becker County Sheriff, integrity and respect are essential to the services we provide. As our leader, this starts with me and also each staff member. Accountability is essential to the community which we serve and protect everyday.

As for him running for sheriff, I cannot speculate to his reasons why."

Past awards — and past trauma 

Previously, Peterson was best known for his actions during a call in February 2009 when he was a deputy with the Mahnomen County Sheriff’s Office. In that incident, Peterson’s partner, Chris Dewey, was critically wounded by gunfire while they were investigating a call about a suspected drunk driver. 

When Dewey was shot in the head and the abdomen, Peterson rushed to his aid, and ultimately, put himself at risk to enable paramedics to get to Dewey quickly and load him into an ambulance. Peterson was named Minnesota Law Enforcement Officer of the Year and was also awarded the Minnesota Sheriff’s Association Medal of Valor.

Dewey survived that day but died months later due to complications from his injuries. His killer, Thomas Fairbanks, admitted to shooting Dewey but in his testimony at his trial, said he was drunk, high and feared for his life at the moment he pulled the trigger. A jury convicted Fairbanks of murder and other charges in September 2011. He is currently serving a life sentence.

Peterson took a job with Becker County that same year and worked there for 11 years before he was fired. 

Now he is an officer with the police department in Lake Park, Minnesota, and is running against Glander — the man who fired him — in the election for Becker County Sheriff on Nov. 8. 

A message about mental health 

For Peterson, part of "moving on" has been receiving therapy and mental health treatment for the trauma he has sustained on the job — both from 2009 and another incident in 2019, when a man put a gun to his head during a welfare check. Peterson says he realized the gun was a pellet gun and was able to break free and arrest the suspect after a struggle. 

In 2009, he was put on administrative leave for nine days before going back on the job — without any formal screening or diagnostic process with a mental health professional. At the time, he remembers worrying that other deputies had been covering shifts for him and Dewey, and he didn't want to burden his colleagues. His experience in 2019 with Becker County was similar. He says he was quickly back at his shift the next day without anyone from the administration taking the time to really check on him and his mental health beyond a quick courtesy phone call. 

Peterson didn’t see a therapist until the police union referred him to one during his arbitration process this year. 

He says the work he did with a therapist allowed him to understand the impact the 2009 incident had on his mental health — both the trauma of the event itself and the heavy burden of survivor’s guilt that he still struggles with today. 

The toll was heavy. In the aftermath of the shooting, he says she becomes emotionally distant from his wife and his daughter, which he says contributed to the end of his marriage. He developed anger issues, which in term contributed to the incident for which he lost his job. 

Part of the reason he’s running for sheriff, he says, is to make sure the same thing doesn’t happen to other deputies. In his view, law enforcement personnel who are involved in shootings should not return to work unless they see a mental health professional who is specialized in treating first responders at least three times. 

"They can do what they want at those meetings. But I'm going to lead them to the water. If they drink, they drink, if they don't, they don't. But they're going to get help. They're going to have that option for help," Peterson says. 

Whether he wins or not, Peterson is committed to working to improve mental health for law enforcement and first responders. 

"First responders, we suck it all down. We think we are built different, we can take this is, that's what we're here for. We need to get out of that stigma," he says.