Former Auburn deputy mayor Salim Mehajer has been released from a Sydney police station after being arrested following an altercation with a taxi driver.
Police say the 30-year-old was arrested in Darlinghurst about 5am on Sunday after he allegedly assaulted the 38-year-old taxi driver outside The Star casino.
Mr Mehajer also allegedy stole the driver's Eftpos machine and mobile phone.
The businessman was later charged with assault occasioning actual bodily harm and larceny, but his release from custody was far from smooth.
A taxi driver he had ordered to pick him up from the Day Street police station in the city refused to drive him away.
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"I don't know anything about the story, they asked me to come here - I'm not going to drive them anymore," the cabbie says in Seven News footage of the incident.
The driver then requested police remove Mr Mehajer, but he refused and ignored an officer's requests while holding a mobile phone to his ear.
"You're welcome to wait in the station," the officer said.
"I can't have you sitting in this cab in this laneway."
Mr Mehajer refused to move, arguing the driver had a "duty of care".
At one point during the awkward stand-off, the officer was forced to unlock the back door through the open driver's window.
Mr Mehajer later got in the drivers seat of a waiting car and invited a female journalist in the back seat.
"Jump in, I'll have a little chat to you," he said.
Mr Mehajer will appear at Downing Centre Local Court on April 26.
