Squirrel Turns 'Porch Pirate' After Stealing Candy From Mail Carrier

A squirrel has been caught on camera turning "porch pirate" to steal a candy bar intended for the homeowner's mail carrier.

Porch pirates represent a major cause for concern among Americans today. A report published by home-security platform security.org found that package thieves stole more than $8 billion in merchandise last year.

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Many are taking no action to prevent these thefts either, with 18 percent of online shoppers polled as part of the annual study admitting they take no precautions to protect deliveries, while fewer than one in seven package thefts end up being reported to the police.

But even when you do catch a thief red-handed on something like a security camera, getting any modicum of justice can be almost impossible—especially if the culprit ends up being of the furry four-legged variety, as one homeowner recently found out.

Astonishing footage shared with Newsweek by security device company Ring, captured the moment a squirrel stole candy from a mailbox.

The homeowner, called Kip, told Ring the furry fiend was disrupting what has become a time-honored tradition between them and their mail carrier.

"We leave a Kit Kat in our mailbox every day as a way of saying thank you to our mail carriers," he said. "It seems a local porch pirate dressed as a squirrel decided that they wanted the Kit Kat instead and crawled up the stucco siding, proceeded to pull the Kit Kat out of the mailbox, and took off running. You can see them running across the lawn at the very end of the video."

This isn't the first time a squirrel has seemingly turned its tail to a life of crime.

Back in February, police in Liberty, Missouri, released nutty bodycam footage from an encounter with what they thought was a home intruder.

However, they soon discovered that the alarm had been raised by a rather large squirrel rather than any human assailant.

That's not an isolated incident either. Back in January 2023, a Los Angeles man was left similarly shocked after discovering who had been destroying all of his furniture.

Derrick Downey Jr. took to TikTok to share a clip of the moment the vandal was unmasked as a seemingly innocent squirrel. It could have been much worse though. In November of last year, a squirrel took animal-led thievery to a whole new level after breaking into a woman's house and making off with a knife.

The theft was caught on camera with the jaw-dropping footage of the squirrel escaping with the knife in its mouth subsequently going viral. The message is clear: homeowners be on your guard.