MIAMI: Justin Bieber was arrested in Miami early Thursday for drag racing while intoxicated, news reports here said, in the pop singer's latest in a series of run-ins with the law.

The local NBC television affiliate in Miami reported that at the time of his arrest, Bieber was driving a rented Lamborghini.

The incident is one in a long line of controversial headlines which have tarnished the once clean-cut image of Bieber, who has sold more than 12 million albums since emerging on the music scene in 2009 as a schoolboy sensation.

Just last week, police searched Bieber's Los Angeles mansion over an egg-throwing attack seized illegal drugs and arrested one of the singer's associates.

The 19-year-old Canadian teen idol was accused by a neighbor of causing thousands of dollars in damage to a neighbor's house after pelting it with eggs.

News reports said that in July, authorities at the US-Canada border confiscated marijuana and drug paraphernalia from one of Bieber's tour buses.

He was not on board at the time, media reported.

He also attracted criticism on a recent tour of Australia after allegedly spraying graffiti on a hotel wall.

A tour of South America last year also ran into turbulence, with allegations that he tagged the wall of a Rio de Janeiro hotel and failed to pay a bill in a Buenos Aires nightclub.

Bieber also caused offense by stepping on an Argentine flag thrown onto a stage during a concert. He was also evicted from a luxury hotel in Buenos Aires after a room was damaged.

Over the Christmas holidays, Bieber announced via Twitter that he was “officially retiring.”