Russell Brand has been arrested for criminal damage after police in the US issued a warrant for him.

The comedian and actor was detained "without incident" in New Orleans on Thursday (15 March) and released shortly afterwards after posting bail.

Police issued a warrant on a charge of criminal damage to property valued at $700 (£450).

A photographer has accused the 36-year-old of grabbing his smartphone and throwing it through a window.

Bail was set at $5,000 (£3,200), a spokesman for the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) said.

Brand is in New Orleans working on a film.

Smashed window

Remi Braden, director of public affairs at the New Orleans Police Department, said: "Officers picked up Mr Brand from Harrah's Casino, where he was working on a film.

"He was arrested without incident."

Russell Brand had claimed he took the phone as "a tribute" to Apple boss Steve Jobs, who died last year.

Since Steve Jobs died I cannot bear to see anyone use an iphone irreverently, what I did was a tribute to his memory Russell Brand

Police say he threw the paparazzi photographer's phone through the window of a nearby law firm.

Brand tweeted his fans: "Since Steve Jobs died I cannot bear to see anyone use an iphone irreverently, what I did was a tribute to his memory."

The star split from his wife Katy Perry last year after 14 months of marriage.

The couple met at the MTV Video Music Awards in September 2009 and married in India in October 2010.

Russell Brand, who has starred in films including Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Get Him To The Greek, was arrested at an airport in Los Angeles in 2010 over an alleged attack on a photographer.

Last year he was deported from Japan while travelling with Katy Perry on the Asian leg of her California Dreams tour.