After defecting, Dresnok worked as an actor in propaganda films, some directed by Kim Jong Il,[2] and as an English teacher in Pyongyang.

At one point, Margaret Dresnok fled with James and his younger brother, Joseph Jr., driving for hours, and the three would sleep in the car, essentially becoming homeless.

[10] After almost being sent to a youth detention center, Dresnok was placed in a foster home in Glen Allen, Virginia, under the care of Presbyterian minister Carson T. Overstreet and his wife, Marguarite,[12] where he felt welcomed.

Dresnok would end up dropping out of high school, and joined the Army the day after his 17th birthday,[13] believing it was one of the few opportunities available left for him.

During a short-term leave period, he returned to Richmond, Virginia and married Kathleen Ringwood, who he had met at church a short time earlier.

He reported being treated harshly after "one minor offence", being forced to clean an armored truck with a toothbrush in sub-zero temperatures.

He described it as the first thought he had of crossing into a communist country, although ultimately abandoned the idea at the time, saying that "if you went to the DDR they interrogated you and sent you back.

[10] He was a private first class with the 1st Cavalry Division along the Korean Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea in the early 1960s.

Depressed and having lost any hope for a future outside the army, Dresnok began spending all his military earnings on prostitutes and alcohol.

[15] Having lost hope for his life and future and being unwilling to face punishment, on August 15, 1962, three hours before he was due to meet with Captain Thomas Bryan regarding the court martial, while his fellow soldiers were eating lunch, he ran across a minefield in broad daylight into Kijong-dong in North Korean territory, where he was quickly apprehended by North Korean soldiers.

Beginning in 1978, he was cast in several North Korean films, including one episode of the series Unsung Heroes (as an American villain called "Arthur Cockstead"),[16] and he became a celebrity in the country as a result.

[21] In Crossing the Line, Dresnok explains that after getting married at a young age, he was deployed in West Germany for two years while she remained in the U.S.

After viewing Crossing the Line and seeing one of Dresnok's sons, Bumbea's brother stated he bore a startling resemblance to his missing sister.

[23] After Bumbea's death, Dresnok married his third wife, identified by Jenkins as "Dada", the daughter of a North Korean woman and a Togolese diplomat.

The family lived in a small apartment in Pyongyang, provided to them along with a monthly stipend by the North Korean government.

[3][30] His younger son from his second marriage, James Dresnok, was a student at the Pyongyang University of Foreign Studies, where his father taught English in the 1980s.

[32][33] Dresnok stated that he intended to spend the rest of his life in North Korea, and no amount of money could have enticed him to move back to the West.

[34][35] They released a statement saying that their father told them to remain loyal to Kim Jong Un and they also stated that the US would be destroyed if it launched a preemptive strike against North Korea.