Altercation with mall security leads to misdemeanor charges
TUPELO MS Dec 13 2017 – A Saturday night confrontation between a man and security officers at The Mall at Barnes Crossing ended with 11 hours in jail and three misdemeanor charges for a Tupelo resident.
A cell phone video, which went viral on social media over the weekend, of the incident shows a group of young people congregating just outside the mall entrance around 10:30 p.m. Dec. 9.
Security officers appeared to not be letting them inside the mall, which had just closed, from the video.
Drew Smith, 18, of 415 Park St., Tupelo, stepped into a doorway and confronted an off-duty Tupelo police officer, who was working at the time as a security officer for the mall.
When Smith appeared to chest bump the officer, two armed and uniformed security officers then wrestled him to the ground. Smith was handcuffed and dragged into the mall to await Tupelo police to arrest him.
Smith was booked into the Lee County Adult Jail at 10:59 p.m. Saturday, initially charged with simple assault on a police officer, which is a felony, failure to comply and resisting arrest. The assault charge was later lowered to misdemeanor simple assault. He was released on a total bond of $3,200 Sunday morning. djournal
