LOS ANGELES (AP) – Los Angeles police say diners scattered when a man dropped a 13-foot yellow python on the floor of a sushi restaurant.
Officer Drake Madison says Hiroshi Motohashi, 46, had argued with an employee and stormed out of Iroha Sushi of Tokyo in Studio City on March 20.
Madison says a short time later, Motohashi returned with the giant snake, threw it into the dining room, and walked out again.
Police responded, and Motohashi was arrested on suspicion of making criminal threats. Nobody was hurt.
The snake tried to slither away, but got stuck in a cabinet near the cash register. Animal control agents freed it and took it away.
This isn’t Motohashi’s first run-in with the law over his love of exotic pets. He was convicted in 2005 in federal court of selling endangered animals and venomous lizards.
Ruth Bayang contributed to this report.