Watch: Mail-Eating Monkey Caught by Cops

Reports of a mail-eating, pole dancing monkey in the Hidden Lakes neighborhood sent Sanford Police officers flying into the quiet little neighborhood Monday morning.

When police arrived, they knew immediately they had quite a hairy problem on their hands. The perpetrator, identified as Zeek, was spotted eating mail right out of a resident’s box. He also took a few moments out to swing from a signpost on a street corner.

Hoping to bring the macaque’s monkey business to an end, officers attempted to corral the critter. They soon found out Zeek was willing to take a break from his antics if given a bottle of water, but that realization didn’t occur until after he managed “to pull molding from one of our patrol cars,” the agency wrote on its Facebook page.

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Zeek was held in protective custody until his owner arrived on the scene. Rather than deal with the paperwork involved in a criminal mischief booking, police opted to snap a few shots of the critter instead before releasing him into the custody of his owner.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission reports that Zeek committed a “jail break” before he was found wandering the neighborhood. The little guy managed to twist parts of his cage to make his escape.

It remains unclear if Zeek just wanted to whoop it up in his Sanford neighborhood or if he had plans to become Florida’s next “mystery monkey” following the incarceration of the Tampa Bay area’s famed Cornelius in 2012. That macaque made headlines for years and was even mentioned on the “Colbert Report” before he entered forced retirement at Dade City’s Wild Things zoo.

Photos courtesy of the Sanford Police Department