GOVERNMENT
COPARAZZI TikTok famous ‘copfluencer’ made his name here
Internet famous Deputy Frank Sloup (left) is a sniper on a Pinal County SWAT team. But on this stakeout (right), he’s not waiting to spy a criminal through his rifle’s scope. Rather, he and sidekick cameraman Sam Salzwedel are waiting to spot their next viral TikTok moment through the viewfinder of Sam’s camcorder.
BY ELIAS WEISS
gear, but he doesn’t want to miss a viral moment. “I’ve seen you on social media,” the driver says. Sloup responds: “Yeah, that’s it. I’m out there doing exactly this, stopping people from criminal speed on MCG.” Sidekick cameraman Sam Salzwedel films the interaction from inside the cruiser and uploads it to YouTube a couple of days later. The video grabs 653,000 views right after it’s posted. Meh, small potatoes. A single YouTube video from November sits at 41 million views. In the last four months, the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office YouTube channel has tripled its subscribers to about 750,000. The “Fridays with Frank” show has drawn an eye-popping 262 million views on YouTube — and 36 million more on TikTok. “I was confident that it would go well,” Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb told InMaricopa . “I wasn’t surprised it became popular. It was only surprising to me just how popular it became.” Lamb last month touted PCSO eclipsed NYPD — the biggest and then-most followed police department in America — in social media followers. “After 2020, there aren’t famous cops anymore,” Sloup told InMaricopa minutes after that traffic stop. “But now there’s me in Pinal County, the land of the dirt people. Here I am.” Pilot officer Sheriff Lamb, who was a business owner and marketer in a past life, was quick to sign his department up for A&E Network’s “Live PD” and “60 Days In.” He and his crew are accustomed to sitting in the viewfinder — and the director’s chair. PCSO last year won an Emmy Award for its public service announcement, “Left lane campers BUSTED,” filmed by Salzwedel on State Route 347 near Maricopa and posted to YouTube.
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centered on the black rally stripe that bisects his car. With windows tinted to the legal max, it’s hard to make him out before he pops open the driver’s side door. But this criminal speeder already knows who he’s dealing with — the internet’s most viral cop, who just happens to patrol the streets around Maricopa. As Sloup approaches the driver’s window, a furry grey puffball of a microphone muff peeks out from behind the taser tucked into his tactical vest. Not the most standard law enforcement
EPUTY FRANK SLOUP’S knuckles are as white as his unmarked Dodge Charger as he speeds west along Maricopa-Casa Grande Highway.
He didn’t plan to write any tickets on his way to an interview with InMaricopa that morning — not until he clocked a turn-of-the-century Dodge Caliber zooming at 87 miles per hour in a 50 zone. Red and blue lights strobe beside a shrewdly tongue-in-cheek sticker reading “PLEASE BE PATIENT, STUDENT DRIVER,” neatly
InMaricopa.com | April 2024
April 2024 | InMaricopa.com
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