Video Of Cop Arresting Philly City Official 'Very Concerning': Mayor

PHILADELPHIA — A Philadelphia city official filmed part of a highway traffic stop that resulted in a state trooper arresting her and her husband Saturday morning, and the mayor called the video "very concerning."

Mayor Cherelle L. Parker said that Celena Morrison, the city's executive director of the Office of LGBT Affairs, was in a vehicle that police stopped on the Vine Street Expressway.

"A video circulating on social media that depicts a portion of the incident is very concerning to me, and I will have no further comment until the investigation has been completed," Parker said.

Her husband was also taken into custody, according to troopers and the city LGBT center he works for. Pennsylvania State Police did not name either person in an incident report, and Patch is only naming Morrison at this time as she is a city official.

A trooper reportedly stopped the driver of a gray Infiniti sedan for multiple vehicle code violations around 9:09 a.m. Saturday on I-76 westbound. Before the trooper had talked to the driver, police said, a green Dodge sedan pulled up behind the trooper's vehicle.

The Dodge driver got out and "became verbally combative" with the trooper and refused his orders, according to the police incident report. The trooper tried to arrest the man, and he reportedly resisted.

The driver of the Infiniti got out and tried to interfere with the man's arrest, police said. Both were booked for obstruction of justice, disorderly conduct, and resisting arrest.

Video that Morrison took, and was later posted to social media, shows a trooper standing over a man she identifies as her husband on the side of the expressway. The man has his hands behind his back as the trooper is arresting him.

"That's my husband, please," she says as her husband tells her it is all right. Morrison says she works for the mayor in the clip, and said she does not know why this is happening.

Her husband asks the trooper if he is being arrested because he is Black, which the trooper denies.

"Yes it is!" Morrison replies.

The officer walks toward her, orders her to turn around, and the camera angle is flipped around to just show the sky.

“He just punched me,” Morrison says in the clip.

The rest of the video is mostly just audio of police and the couple talking back and forth, and cuts off after about three minutes.

The two were taken into custody but later released, according to 6ABC.