Republican Pima County sheriff candidate Terry Frederick left his deputy job after entering into a settlement agreement with the department in which he admitted damaging county property and potentially endangering other officers, 2004 Pima County Superior Court records show.
Frederick told Arizona Luminaria in a June interview that he believes the department’s claims against him were retribution because he supported a Republican sheriff candidate running against the Democratic incumbent. Now a private investigator, Frederick is running as a Republican candidate. He said he worked at the Pima County Sheriff’s Department from 2000 to 2004.
Frederick said he “had a target on his back” because he was helping his sergeant at the time run for sheriff. That sergeant was Roland Youngling, who lost to former Sheriff Clarence Dupnik in 2004. In this year’s race, Youngling endorsed Bill Phillips, another Republican primary candidate.
Frederick is running in the primary against fellow Republicans, current Lieutenant Heather Lappin and former Lieutenant Phillips, both of the Pima County Sheriff’s Department. The winner of the Republican primary will face either incumbent Chris Nanos or challenger Sandy Rosenthal. The primary election is July 30, with early voting beginning July 3.
Arizona Luminaria checked the background of each candidate running for sheriff this year. See the background checks for other candidates. Arizona Luminaria found that neither Rosenthal nor Phillips had significant legal histories — as was the case with the other three candidates — to merit an explanation to voters.
Frederick told Arizona Luminaria that his troubles with the department began when he got into a traffic accident while in a patrol vehicle while he was still a deputy. He said the accident was not his fault and that a citation stemming from the accident was never served to him, which resulted in a suspended license.
Frederick stressed that he was not fired from the department and that his record remains clean with the Arizona Peace Officer Standards and Training Board, a state agency that has authority to investigate allegations of misconduct against law enforcement officers and suspend or revoke an officer’s professional certification.
“I ultimately resigned because I wanted to maintain my certification,” Frederick said.
Frederick has no case history involving misconduct on file and his license was in good standing until 2004 when it was not renewed, according to Arizona Peace Officer Standards and Training Board public records reviewed by Arizona Luminaria.
Lawsuits ensued
When Frederick left his job at the Pima County Sheriff’s Department in 2004, he entered into a settlement agreement with the department in which “he agreed to admit that he engaged in conduct that damaged County property and potentially endangered other officers,” according to a June 16, 2004 Pima County Superior Court minute entry.
“Frederick agreed to resign from the department in lieu of termination,” according to the court record.
In exchange, according to the same court record, the department agreed it would not notify the Arizona Peace Officer Standards and Training Board of any details except that he was no longer with the department.
When Frederick applied for jobs at other law enforcement agencies in the state, one of the investigators looking into his employment history recommended that he not be hired because of a number of factors, including that he had a suspended driver’s license after not paying a citation following an on-duty traffic accident, court records show.
After leaving the department, Frederick sued then-sheriff Dupnik, alleging the sheriff’s department failed to uphold their confidential settlement agreement.
Suing both for damages and to be reinstated to the department, Frederick’s allegations of harm included not being hired by another Arizona law enforcement agency after they discovered that there was a sealed envelope in his personnel file. The contents of the envelope were not revealed. Frederick was not hired by the other law enforcement agency.
Frederick told Arizona Luminaria in a June interview that the jobs he was applying to at the time were with the Arizona Department of Public Safety and Oro Valley Police Department.
Frederick’s lawsuit against Dupnik was dismissed, with a court ruling in 2004 stating “there is no evidence” that the department breached the settlement agreement with Frederick, according to Pima County Superior Court records.
Frederick also had his driver’s license suspended twice in Ohio, which he did not initially state in a job interview, according to a response filed in the 2004 lawsuit on behalf of former sheriff Dupnik.
Frederick did not disclose that he had been investigated by internal affairs “concerning his truthfulness following a patrol vehicle accident,” nor that he had previously been fired by a debt collector, according to the same court filing.
Frederick reiterated that he believes he was politically targeted and that what he endured 20 years ago at the department only made him more determined to continue his commitment to public service working as a private investigator. He said that as a certified investigator he has the opportunity to help people defend themselves in court.
“I’m no slouch. I look at everything,” Frederick said. “I’m a firm believer in the Constitution that everybody has a right to proper defense.”
Frederick’s focus on the campaign
Frederick says he is running to become a “constitutional sheriff,” a concept from a fringe political movement that sees county sheriffs as possessing the ultimate power within their territory as well as the ability to both interpret and nullify laws they view as unconstitutional.
Frederick is endorsed by former sheriff of Graham County Richard Mack, who founded the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association.
At a sheriff candidate forum on June 17, Frederick said that he would create an Arizona Ranchers Patrol Unit to patrol rural areas for “illegals,” referring to people who cross the border without legal permission. Pima County’s boundaries include about 130 miles of the U.S.-México border.
“We need change in leadership. It’s toxic,” Frederick said at the forum. He defined strong leadership as “not about being in charge but taking care of those in your charge, not stabbing people in the back and then laughing about it.”
Frederick also ran for sheriff in 2012, receiving 15% of the vote, which was 10,369 votes in the Republican primary. That landed him in second place to Mark Napier’s 43%, or 28,894 votes.
Frederick now runs Vegas Investigations, a private company. He lives in Tucson and works in Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, Utah and Texas.
Frederick accepted an illegal $500 campaign contribution from Innovative Care Physicians LLC, which is based in Las Vegas, according to 2024 campaign finance reports filed with the Pima County Elections Department. The contribution was illegal because it’s against Arizona law for candidates to receive contributions from corporations, and was first reported by the Tucson Sentinel.
Frederick told the Sentinel that he was not aware of the rule and promised to return the money ASAP.
“My passion is law enforcement, because I want to contribute to the community,” Frederick told Arizona Luminaria. He said that while he’s making good money now, he’s willing to make a financial sacrifice to serve the public.
“If I can contribute to making this a safer community, safer streets, a thriving community, that’s all I want,” Frederick said.
He added: “I want people to know that they have a sheriff that they can count on to take care of things, not only accurately, but under the guidance of the Constitution.”
Read more about this series
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