The call came in as a murder, but when police arrived they found a very different scene.
A Harriman, Tennessee couple became the victims of a prank call Saturday night which ended with a SWAT team outside their door.
"911 received a phone call," said Harriman PD Chief, Randy Heidle. "An individual stated that he had just shot his wife, and that he was going to shoot any officers that [came] up to the apartment."
He dispatched his officers to the apartment in downtown Harriman, including the department's SWAT team who were surrounding the area. However, he soon got the woman living inside the home on the phone.
"I started talking to her and right away, I started realizing something wasn't right. I don't think we actually had a murder," Heidle said.
Very much alive and uninjured, that woman was Victoria Paulin. She and her husband had just finished playing a video game online called "Call of Duty" when they realized there were armed officers outside their home.
They quickly made the connection.
"I did call 911, and they got the chief of police on the line," explained Paulin, "And we explained to them that we were playing online and some kids had made some threats and we shut the game off, but we never thought that anything like that would happen, that the house would be surrounded and the SWAT team would be outside of our door."
The couple were "streaming" as they played the video game, allowing them to play with friends and strangers online. Players can watch each other inside their homes as they play. Paulin said it's one way she and her husband keep in touch with friends and family across the country.
Police believe one of the players they met online hacked the couple's personal information to make the prank call.
"Their address, their phone number, their name and everything," Chief Heidle said, which made the 911 call even more believable to his officers.
"You feel violated," Paulin said. "I know I personally feel violated. I never would have thought somebody would get my personal information and make harassing phone calls, or go to the extent of sending police to my home."
It was a prank that cost Heidle -- and taxpayers -- hours of officer overtime, pulled patrols from other parts of the community, and risked safety.
"A lot of things could have happened from this crank call," Heidle said.
"When you get on the internet and you're playing some of these games, you don't know who this is person is-- you're opening yourself up to some things that can happen to you. I'm not saying you shouldn't do it, I'm just saying you should be more careful."
Paulin said she and her husband, who are both adults and playing an adult video game, will likely continue to play but be more careful about personal information. She said hackers chose that method to steal their information, but there are a number of other ways they could have accessed it through the internet.
The couple also said they do not allow their children to play the video games online with strangers, and didn't allow it even before the threat hit them.
They encourage other parents to be cautious, and learn from their experience.
"Speak to the children, and let them know things like this can happen and it's not a joke," she said. "It's something serious, people can get hurt, and if anybody ever makes a reference to 'swatting them' then they definitely need to speak to an adult and get that cleared up."
