Two Penn State students are facing criminal mischief charges for breaking off the Nittany Lion Shrine’s right ear, as first reported by Aimee Lewis of WJAC and confirmed on the Penn State Police crime log.

Two teenagers are facing criminal mischief charges for breaking off the ear of the Nittany Lion Shrine in February. They'll also pay $468 in fines, each. — Aimee Lewis (@aimee_lewisTV) March 27, 2018

The ear was broken off on State Patty’s Day, Saturday, February 24, already notorious as a day of debauchery in State College. But this time it went too far.

Skylar Belden and Matthew Deutch are both undergraduate students at University Park, according to the Penn State directory. Lewis reported each will pay $468 in fines.

The missing ear was reported to campus police just after 9 p.m., and police recovered the ear and kept it in their possession until Penn State’s Office of the Physical Plant (OPP) repaired it the following Wednesday. In between, Penn State’s 3-D Printing Club tricked out the symbol of our best with a temporary replacement.

This is the fourth time the Nittany Lion has lost its right ear; the shrine was vandalized in 1978 and again in 1994. Most recently, the ear was damaged in 2003, then appearing accidental.