LA landmark sign 'Hollywood' altered to 'Hollyweed' in New Year

Los Angeles, Jan 2 (IANS) The Hollywood Sign, a landmark and American cultural icon located in Los Angeles, was vandalised on Sunday to read "Hollyweed", celebrating the recent legalisation of recreational marijuana in California.

According to the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), surveillance footage caught one person dressed in all black sneaking up to the sign around 3 a.m. and spending about an hour and a half transforming the O' s to E' s by two pieces of black trap with graphic of anti-nuclear war and love, Xinhua news agency reported.

Robert Payan of LAPD was quoted by the Los Angeles Times as saying that it could be a News Year prank or a work of "thrill seeker". So far LAPD was reviewing security footage to try to track down the trespasser but had not any suspect.

Local media believed that the modification could be a reference to Californians voting on November 8 last year to legalise recreational marijuana in the state, which joined six other states and the District of Columbia from 2017 in allowing the drug's non-medical use.

The incident was not the first time that the sign had been changed to other words.

Danny Finegood, who passed away in 2007, was made famous by changing the sign to "Hollyweed" on January 1, 1976, in celebration of the state's then more relaxed marijuana laws taking effect.

In 1987, some Caltech students changed it to read the name of their University.

--IANS

lok/