Reported burglar at North Carolina home was robotic vacuum

Dec. 26 (UPI) -- A North Carolina couple who believed there was a burglar in their home called 911 and responding deputies quickly identified the suspect -- a robotic vacuum.

The Forsyth County Sheriff's Office responded to a 911 call in the early hours of Christmas Day from a couple who said they heard an intruder downstairs.

The couple hid in their closet until deputies arrived to search the home.

The deputies soon found the cause of the sounds heard by the couple -- their robotic vacuum.

Homeowner Thomas Milam said he and his partner had only owned the Eufy robotic vacuum, which they dubbed Harry, for three days.

"It definitely is better safe than sorry because having heard what we did, I still would have called the police and because you just never know," Milam told WGHP-TV.

The Washington County Sheriff's Office in Oregon responded to a similar incident in April, when a woman called to report a burglar had locked themselves in her bathroom. The woman told deputies she could see movement under the door of the locked bathroom.

The sheriff's office said deputies forced the door open with their guns drawn.

"As we entered the home we could hear 'rustling' in the bathroom," the sheriff's office quoted a Deputy Rogers as saying. "We made several announcements and the 'rustling' became more frequent. We breached the bathroom door and encountered a very thorough vacuuming job being done by a Roomba Robotic Vacuum cleaner."