German tourists accused of drawing antisemitic graffiti in Miami Beach
The Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office is reviewing recent Miami Beach arrests involving antisemitic graffiti on an LGBTQ Pride bench in South Beach as a possible hate crime.
On Monday, two German tourists were arrested after being accused of drawing a swastika and the words “Adolf was here” on a rainbow bench by the Pride crosswalk near 12th Street and Ocean Drive.
According to the Miami Beach Police Department, officers used city camera footage to help identify and track two men who were seen vandalizing the bench in Lummus Park. Officers found the men in question, later identified as Christoph Rehak and Gunther Manfred Jekschtat, at the Colony Hotel, where they were detained for questioning.
During interviews with police, Rehak confessed to borrowing his friend’s marker and writing the antisemitic graffiti on the bench, according to police. Rehak said he wrote the slurs on the bench “as a joke,” according to authorities, and investigators said Rehak did not show “intent of the remark as being a hate crime.”
Both Rehak and Jekschtat were arrested and charged with first-degree misdemeanors for criminal mischief of more than $200 and less than $1000.
But the offense could be escalated to a third-degree felony under Florida’s Hate Crime Enhancement statute, according to a spokesperson from the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office. The statute, which was enacted in 2023, allows the state to apply harsher penalties if a crime qualifies as a hate crime offense.
Hate crime offenses in Florida include acts committed based on the race, color, ancestry, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, national origin, homeless status, or advanced age of the victim.
The incident sparked immediate outrage among Miami Beach officials and prompted a discussion at the City Commission meeting on Wednesday.
“Hate like that ultimately and always leads to violence. We’ve seen that throughout thousands of years of history,” Mayor Steven Meiner said. “I’m very appreciative of everyone who took swift action.”
Christofer Burger, the Consul General of Germany based in Miami, said at the meeting that, in this case, “it does make a difference that these tourists came from Germany.”
“As a nation, we bear responsibility for the worst crime in human history: the Holocaust,” Burger said, adding that he reassured Miami Beach officials that the tourists’ actions were “not representative” of the German people.
“We as a nation do not tolerate antisemitism, we do not tolerate hate against anyone. We stand united against bigotry,” Burger said.
Meiner noted that Miami Beach police were able to identify the suspects using city camera systems and the Real Time Intelligence Center “within hours” of the act.
“We intend to prosecute them to the full extent of the law,” Meiner wrote on social media.
Miami Beach Commissioner Alex Fernandez, the only openly gay member of the Miami Beach City Commission, said on social media that gay and Jewish people were among the groups “targeted by Nazi Germany.”
“Gay men and others accused of homosexuality were sent to concentration camps, often marked with pink triangles, and subjected to medical experiments and execution,” wrote Fernandez in a public Facebook post.
The bench that was defaced was donated by Miami Beach Commissioner Joseph Magazine in April following Florida’s controversial decision to remove the area’s LGBTQ-themed crosswalk last year.
This story was produced with financial support from Trish and Dan Bell and donors in South Florida’s Jewish and Muslim communities, including Khalid and Diana Mirza and the Mohsin and Fauzia Jaffer Foundation, in partnership with Journalism Funding Partners. The Miami Herald maintains full editorial control of this work.
This story was originally published May 20, 2026 at 1:49 PM.
