Steve Lee Hayes carved letters onto a pillar of a gate of a shrine in Shibuya and was arrested on suspicion of property damage, Tokyo police said.

Japanese police have arrested a 65-year-old American tourist for allegedly defacing a Tokyo shrine. The man, identified as Steve Hayes, is accused of using his fingernails to scratch five letters into a torii gate at the Meiji Jingu shrine on Tuesday morning.

An American tourist was arrested for vandalism at a historic shrine in Tokyo a day after arriving in the country on vacation with his family.