Via West Midlands Police Press Releases -
Arrested male believed to be Santa Claus found to be imposter, real offender still at large
December 24th 2011
WEST MIDLANDS POLICE have urged members of the public to remain vigilant after it emerged that the male arrested earlier this week believed to be Santa Claus was in fact one of several hundred thousand body doubles.
DS Kimo, from WMP Force CID, stated “Detectives first became suspicious of the male’s story when he was unable to recall the names of all of his reindeer, other than Rudolph which is the one everyone knows. In addition he failed to point out Lapland on a map and spoke with a stronger Midlands accent than we would expect the real Claus to have.
“We then took a DNA sample and confirmed that the male we had in custody was not the real Claus but instead a very realistic lookalike.”
“We have not ruled out the possibility that the male was working with Claus himself as a decoy. Claus remains at large and poses a considerable risk to people across the world, it being likely that as in previous years he will break into millions of houses this evening to spread Christmas joy.”
The male originally arrested has been named as Dave Smith (61) from Lichfield Road, Walsall. Whilst the 4,029,289,486 burglary charges have been dropped against Smith, he is now being questioned in relation to offences of wasting police time and assisting an offender.
Signs that indicate the real Claus is nearby include the sound of bells coming from the roof, empty Coca Cola bottles left in the snow and the sight of a reindeer-drawn flying sleigh silhouetted against the full moon.
DS Kimo’s advises people across the West Midlands and further afield to “Keep your curtains closed, your chimneys blocked and most importantly have a very merry Christmas!”.
ENDS
