O Face Owner Arrested on Suspicion of Sexual Abuse

Matthew Overmyer, the co-owner of Bar Rescue's most infamous episode at O Face, was arrested Thursday on suspicion of second-degree sexual abuse and assault with intent to commit sexual abuse by the Pottawattamie County Sheriff’s Office (Link to arrest document).

Omaha.com reports that the assault took place at a house, and Overmyer attacked an adult woman who works at O Face at midnight on Tuesday.  He reportedly "used physical force, including choking, to have sex with the victim twice."  The victim called several people after the alleged attack, and one source told investigators that Overmyer tried to re-enter the room after the victim locked him out.

The suspected assault allegedly took place while Overmyers wife (co-owner of the bar) was out of town.

Matthew Overmyer did not speak to investigators and his lawyer said he will plead not guilty and expects the case to be dismissed.  Overmyer faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted and is free after posting a $50,000 bail.

I will keep you updated on the progress of this story and the case as more details emerge.

Also, I know many people think O Face is closed due to multiple review sites listing it as closed, however the bar is still open.  After this, who knows....

UPDATE 10/2016 - Matthew Overmyer plead guilty to the sexual assault charges and was ordered to spend 90 days in jail.  He also has two years of probation following his sentence and will undergo a sex offender treatment program. A no contact order with the victim has been issued for five years.  Matthew Overmyer also will have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life and pay any restitution to the victim, should she seek counseling. (Link)

UPDATE 3/2017 -  Matthew Overmyer was ordered to pay $4,640 in restitution to the victim, which was a lowered figure. (Link)

UPDATE 4/2017 - Matthew Overmyer went back to jail for failing to register as a sex offender. (Link)

Judge Says O'Face From Bar Rescue Should Be Allowed To Renew Liquor License

You may recall back in May, the Council Bluffs City Council voted against renewing O'Face's liquor license due to their appearance on Bar Rescue and the negative publicity surrounding the bar.  O'Face appealed this decision to the Iowa Alcoholic Beverages Division on July 28th, and on August 11th an Iowa judge ruled that O'Face should be allowed to renew their license.  The judge ruled that there wasn't enough evidence to support the denial of the liquor license, and that Council Bluffs didn't provide the episode of Bar Rescue on which it relied on to deny the license.  The only evidence was owner Matthew Overmyer's testimony, and based on the limited evidence, the judge ruled to reverse the decision of rejecting O'Face's liquor license renewal.

This decision is still not final, as it can be appealed by either party within 30 days.  Also, the Iowa Beverages Division does not have to agree with the judges decision.  If they do not agree with the judges decision, Matthew Overmyer can then appeal to the district court.

Another thing that is interesting is the testimony of Matthew Overmyer at the hearing. The full document is here, but the highlights include:

• He was told during their audition video, which had a staged fight, that the footage would only be shown to Jon Taffer and Spike TV executives.
• When the film crew arrived, they "wanted to show chaos at the bar, including fighting, disorderly conduct, and an empty bar without customers."
• The bar was not open to the public or regular customers during the filming, and Bar Rescue provided the customers for the stress test to complain about the food, drinks, and service.
• Both fights on the episode were done after the Bar Rescue crew suggested they needed more drama.
• He said he told the film crew that he was done with the "shenanigans" and would not cooperate with filming any more staged scenarios.  The crew left saying they would use the footage they had.  
• Matthew was surprised and embarrassed to see the casting video as part of the footage of the actual show.
• O'Face has seen a decline in business since their Bar Rescue episode aired.

It is pretty much things we assume and have heard with other Bar Rescue episodes, however it is interesting that he says they told the crew they were done staging scenes which caused them to leave. 

Would Jon Taffer have walked out on this Bar Rescue if O'Face continued giving the film crew what they wanted?  Or are we to even believe what Matt claimed?  I guess the only people that know for sure were the people involved in the taping of the show.

O'Face's Liquor License Suspended Seven Days and Fined $1,000

On May 30th, O'Face agreed to a settlement with the Iowa Alcoholic Beverages Division for an incident that occurred at their bar on November 11th, 2012.  The bar admitted guilt and said they "sold, dispensed, or gave an alcoholic beverage or beer to persons who were intoxicated at the time."

According to the settlement, O'Face will have their liquor license suspended for seven days from 8am, October 5, 2014 to 8am, October 12, 2014.  During that period, the bar can remain open for other lawful activities, but no alcohol of any kind can be sold or given away during that time frame.  They also must pay $1,000 to the Iowa Alcoholic Beverages Division.

Here is the link with information regarding the settlement.

This comes just after the Council Bluffs City Council rejected their liquor license.  O'Face appealed that decision, and has a hearing date for their liquor license renewal on July 28th (link to documents).  Look for an update on that after the hearing occurs.

The Bar Rescue O'Face Fight Video - Where Did It Come From?

On a recent episode of Bar Rescue at O'Face Bar in Council Bluffs, Iowa, Jon Taffer decided to walk out on the bar and not do the rescue.  The breaking point was a video that Jon obtained of the owner Matt slapping one of his bartenders named Dave in the face, which was saved until the end of the episode.  This had many people wondering where Jon got the video and did he have the video all along?

First, lets look at what Jon Taffer had to say about the video:

• A fan recently asked Jon Taffer on Twitter: "how did you get the o’face bar footage of the fights at the end? Seemed really staged and fake"
• To which Jon responded: "Nothing is staged of faked on the show. That video came from someone who will remain unnamed."

So, Jon is going with an unnamed source for how they obtained the video.


Hit That Dive from Omaha was at the bar when the episode aired and followed up with a few interviews of the bar's employees. 

• I asked him to find out where Jon Taffer got the video of the slap.
• He later tweeted: "The "fight" between #ofacebar owner and his employee Dave was from their audition tape when #BarRescue wanted "MORE DRAMA". #Fake"
• Steve from Hit That Dive also commented on the original O'Face post regarding Matt slapping Dave, stating:  "I just got this from Amanda..."Steve that was a clip from our audition tape when they wanted "more drama". AKA...staged."

Hit That Dive is saying that through talking with employees, the video was from their audition tape for Bar Rescue.


Finally, Dave, who is the bartender on the episode that got slapped by Matt has responded to multiple people about it on his Facebook page, and here are some of his comments:

• Comment 1 - "We were all drunk for the show & that was our viewing for john taff to decide if he wanted to come or not the producers pushed us to have drama to influnce john to come . So really im gonna let someone slap me n not do nothing ha ha u know better. Thx mike ur good people also"
• Comment 2 about him not fighting back "Omg 4 real if you dont think 4 once i would not come back with a right hook if ever slapped? Come on 4 real"
• Comment 3 saying the fight was for show  - "Wow mike u have no reason to say that bout my boss didnt u read my post it was for show & he would never do that & mike if it did i can handle my own so no reason to have attitude towards him." 
• The owner Karen even weighed in saying, "What part don't people get that the fight wasn't real"

Dave said the producers pushed them to have drama so Jon would choose their bar to be rescued, and that the fight was not real. 

 
So that leaves everyone to form their own opinion on where the video came from and if it was real/fake.  

Here is mine.  When Bar Rescue comes to a city, they tell multiple bars they are under consideration and that Jon will be coming to 1 of the 3 bars (see question 3 in this link).  This probably encourages the bars to do things that they think will make for good TV in hopes of getting picked over the other bars.  Producers probably told this to O'Face, so they decided to stage not 1, but 2 fights in hopes of getting a free makeover.  This also lets Jon Taffer claim that nothing is scripted as they do not tell people what to do, but let them know they need to be interesting to be picked. 

The camera quality and sound quality on the video of Matt slapping Dave is pretty good and not too shaky as you normally see on regular Youtube videos.  Also, there is no reaction from the camera operator filming this fight (no narration or "Ohhhhh") and the other people besides Bryan in the video don't react either.  So, I will buy that it was staged and assume that Bar Rescue producers are the ones that filmed the fight.  I don't think there was an "unnamed source" that provided Jon with the video of this.  Whether Jon knew about this fight the first day or found out later could be debated I guess, but you would assume he would have known.  

If you look at the additional videos of O'Face on the Spike website like this one, you will see that Jon was genuinely giving them advice, so I don't think the bar was being used to be walked out on.  I think maybe Jon got fed up with everyone after dealing with them for 4 days, and used the fight video that they had as the excuse to stop helping them.



*If you are interesting in watching the video of the slap again, fast forward to 37:15 on the episode at the Spike website (warning - it will make you watch 5 commercials first).