St. Louis police accounts of Bar:PM owner assaulting officers refuted by video, lawyer says

A south St. Louis bar owner has been released from the St. Louis City Justice Center after a Monday morning incident in which a St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department officer crashed a car into the bar.

Bar:PM co-owner Chad Morris was initially charged with third-degree felony assault and resisting arrest, claiming Morris struck an officer after the crash. The charges were later reduced to a misdemeanor.

A police report following the incident said the officer driving the car realized he was driving too close to a parked car when he lost control of the vehicle and then crashed into the popular Carondelet gay bar. Additional officers arrived at the scene and claimed Morris pushed an officer before being arrested.

But video footage from a bystander contradicts the initial charges, Morris’ lawyer Javad Khazaeli said.

Khazaeli shared portions of the video, which shows officers asking Morris’s husband, James Pence, for identification. When Pence questioned why, officers handcuffed him. The video also showed an officer confronting the bystander who questioned why arrests were being made. The officer said, “he’s not going to yell at me” and “he’s causing a disturbance.”

Morris yelled at several officers, and the video shows police following Morris down an alley. When they leave the alley, Morris is dragged out in handcuffs and thrown into the back of a police van, but the shared footage didn’t show Morris striking an officer.