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Fairfax County police’s social and public affairs division was struck by a recent social media trend they came across while monitoring it for relevant information.
Other police agencies had been using a pointer stick to highlight key moments in an officers’ dash camera footage in the seconds before a crash happened. It’s something they immediately wanted to replicate.
So, Katie Hayek, the department’s director of communications, jumped on the trend and bought a long pointer stick topped with a white gloved hand similar to the one worn by Mickey Mouse. Officer Katie Watts, in her tenth year with the Northern Virginia agency, had all the inspiration she needed.
Since late May, Watts has worked behind the scenes posting video footage of some of the most egregious traffic violations. The short clips feature the infraction, paused to highlight things such as a red light, music and a funny quote at the end.
There aren’t any voices. Instead, Watts lets the driving behavior speak for itself.
Millions of people are viewing and engaging the videos with “Tappy,” the pointer’s given name. In July, views reached 19 million on Facebook. The department has over 61,000 Instagram followers, a spike of over 200% since the beginning of January 2024.
They’re using that growing audience to discourage dangerous driving, and ensure drivers stay safe while on county roads.
“We respond to crashes every day,” Watts said. “A lot of these bad crashes happen because you’ve committed a traffic offense, you’re stopping on a highway, or you’re speeding, or you make a turn when you shouldn’t, or you run a red light.”
Breaking down the process
To start, Watts said she spends time reviewing footage from officers’ body and car cameras for recordings of traffic infractions. It’s a process that requires less time when an officer tags their footage.
The clips take anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours to produce, Watts said. To produce the videos, she pauses the footage and points to red lights, or drivers who have their signal on but cut across several lanes of traffic. In a recent example, a car tried to make a lane change in the middle of an intersection because the driver missed the left turn.
The violations Watts chooses are usually “super obvious” things, such as red light violations or drivers not stopping when a school bus has its stop arms out.
The footage typically includes an officer’s sirens or shows a citation getting printed inside the police car, and frequently conclude with a takeaway message. In one video, the finishing message was, “That yellow light was basically begging for you to hit the brakes.”
Leaning into the trend
The video approach involves “showing humor where it’s appropriate, professionally, but also like, ‘Hey, we’re human, too. We also think this is a crazy violation that we just witnessed.’ So it’s just telling the story in a fun way,” Watts said.
While it may be challenging to predict why the Tappy videos are popular, Watts said it’s satisfying to watch when someone does something wrong on the road and is then held accountable.
A glance from an officer’s car camera quickly grabs attention, Watts said, as do the sound that a body camera makes when it turns on. The videos also give social media users an opportunity to engage and ask questions about laws that might be unfamiliar.
“It’s the educational component of anyone that sees it,” Watts said. “It’s like, ‘Let’s not do this, because then you’re going to end up getting a ticket and meet us that way.’”
Sometimes, the videos include music, and Watts said the agency tries to keep descriptions evergreen, so they’re always relevant. They’ve done nine Tappy videos so far, and launched a “FCPD Driver’s Ed” series, too.
Officials are expecting the extra social media attention to help the department with recruitment and ensure the roads remain safe.
“We could use this to educate people and to show in a unique way the stuff that our officers are doing every day,” Watts said. “We leaned into the trend, and we made it our own.”
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