Along with festin', crowds also brought crime to the French Quarter over the weekend. A trio escaped St. Peter St. with a woman's purse on Saturday morning, but they couldn't escape surveillance video later. On Sunday, a man was arrested for bringing a boxcutter to a barfight, while a cop cornered another in the act of graffiti on Bourbon. Click through for details:

Fred Radtke, better known as the The Grey Ghost, may have fallen out of the news cycle, but the man and his mission to eradicate New Orleans of graffiti still lurk in New Orleans. Today, he appears in a YouTube clip filmed by Yacht Bounce and Gypsohphonic Disko purveyor DJ Quickie Mart. In the video, Quickie Mart approaches Radtke, and asks him if he is taking down a "Missing" poster for Lafayette woman Mickey Shunick. Radtke doesn't respond to any of Quickie Mart's questions over the 38-second video. Radtke is wearing an "Operation Clean Sweep" shirt, representing his nonprofit Operation Clean Sweep. Click through to view:

There's no second thoughts in the L.A. Guns camp. In their recent NoDef interview with Skylar Fein, local graffiti artists The Bourghog Guild talked about a recent alteraction outside the Marigny club Siberia with the manager of hair metal band L.A. Guns after writing R.I.P L.A. Guns on the door of their tour trailer. "Next to some stickers," the Bourghog Guild told Fein. "It was clean, yeah. I understood why I got knocked out. I deserved it." Apparently Markham agrees. After seeing the article on a Facebook post by the band's singer Tracii Guns, the manager wrote, "Now you know why the second one got bitch slapped before i knocked him out." 

Marigny-Bywater residents mystified by the recent wave of R.I.P.-themed graffiti may find solace (or rage) in the following: the drippy messages that say things like "R.I.P. Cy Twombly," "R.I.P. Banksy" (on top of an actual Banksy), and "R.I.P. Swoon" (on top of a Swoon), messages that have declared the death of writers, politicians and food items, are the work of two young men, and perhaps more, who live in the 9th Ward and work under the name Bourghog Guild.

The French Quarter is cracking down on graffiti, and a warning has gone out to all who would seek to deface the historic neighborhood: Put down your sharpies. Anthony Chapman, 32, was arrested about noon on Wednesday when a police officer observed him allegedly drawing with a magic marker on the side of Uncle Wilbur's Emporium, a gift shop owned by Cafe du Monde located at 1039 Decatur.

Deep in the heart of Mid City lies a hidden skate park. For over a year skaters, outfitted like pack mules, have been toting bags of cement through the underbrush, then pouring and shaping a bowl. To beautify the space, the city's only skate park, they've commissioned murals from New Orleans street artists, including MRSA.

NOLARising street-art savant Rex Dingler and his longtime nemesis Fred Radtke (nee the Gray Ghost) are both in an art show this week at the sub-Broad St. overpass Art Egg Studios. Levels of irony are boundless. Graffiti being displayed indoors. Radtke joining a club of artists that he spent so much time tweaking off. But, time seems to have closed the wounds in Dingler's soul, as he's quoted on NOLAFemmes describing Radtke's decision to participate as "admirable." (VIA)

Our state legislature is now hard at work addressing the most pressing issue facing our region-- oil. Make that oil-based paint. Yes, folks, love it or hate it, the anti graffiti crusade is back on! New legislation in Baton Rouge unanimously passed by the Senate and awaiting approval from the House penalizes graffiti on historic buildings and landmarks with jail time and a mandatory $1000 fine.