The Anasazi Heritage Center suffered nearly $1,800 worth of damage last week after vandals marked the center’s trail to Ancestral Puebloans ruins with graffiti.

Lanny Wagner, the BLM law-enforcement agent investigating the crime, said the "tagging" was mostly initials painted in green on benches, rocks, garbage cans, and scratched into a metal interpretative sign.

The sign, which recounts the history of Big Bend and McPhee, will have to be replaced at a cost of $1,400.

Wagner found the vandalism last Friday, and said it probably occurred some time on the night of June 14.

"It appeared to be some initials, and it was done in a certain manner to where you could tell where the person had done it many, many times before just the way it was done, and the quickness of when it was done," said Wagner.

The graffiti was unintelligible, but Wagner was able to gather a few facts about the crime from it.

"It had the look of somebody wanting to say that they were in a gang, or something like that. But I think it was more of a gang-wannabe type of thing," said Wagner.