Uniformed patrol can be a thankless job, but many cops find that the occasional dose of adventure makes it worthwhile. In Watertown, South Dakota, a couple of officers stepped into the unknown when they were dispatched to a potential burglary in progress at a rental property. 

The department shared the body-cam footage from the call, which shows a pair of officers stacking up at the front door of the property. One officer observes a window that is clearly broken. Recognizing that someone is obviously inside, they draw their weapons and enter.

Fairly quickly, the officers encountered the culprit: a rampaging deer. One can’t help but wonder why the buck bothered to smash his way into the house, because his actions inside made it clear that he wanted to be anywhere else. The two unwilling wildlife wranglers watched, relatively helplessly, as the horned intruder crashed around a bedroom, knocking over items and climbing onto the bed.  

Having clearly been to a circus (or at least seen the old cartoons with the mustachioed lion tamers), they armed themselves with chairs and formed an ad hoc hallway between the bedroom and the front door of the house. After some coaxing, the buck came blasting past them and back into the freedom of the wide-open outdoors. 

A reporter with KELO News later asked one of the responding officers, Sergeant Trumm, whether he was more relieved or shocked when he realized the offender was a wild animal rather than a human criminal. “A little bit of both, because it was toward the end of shift,” he replied. “The burglary call would have kept me a lot longer after my shift ended and the deer definitely got me out of there on time.” 

Amazingly, Trumm said this was the second time so far in his 12-year career that he’d encountered a deer as a burglary suspect, but that doesn’t make it any less memorable. “The other officer who was with me was Officer Klein,” he added. “I told him this is going to be a story we’ll talk about for a while.” 

It’s also a safe assumption that the homeowners later found themselves filing one of the oddest insurance reports on record.