I read it was another employee, so maybe their impression got miscommunicated and the CEO assumed the worst - except without any evidence. Which is still bad behavior given that he hasn't addressed the recording evidence publicly. IIRC he Kafkaesquely accused the very act of recording as evidence of aggression/blackmailing, which is just totally out to lunch IMO.

Steve or not doesn't improve anything about the situation, even worse, since it wouldn't even hurt his ego to apologize on behalf of employee he chose radio silence instead, it just shows the intent is to make third party devs fuck off the platform by whatever means necessary