Sea Girt Tree Lighting Vandal's ID Turns Anger To Laughter

SEA GIRT, NJ — When Sea Girt officials discovered the Christmas lights strung joyfully around the borough's Christmas trees weren't working ahead of the planned tree lighting celebration last week, they thought something foul was afoot.

They suspected vandals of the worst sort. The terribly, humbuggy, Grinchy sort. The kind who would cut wires to prevent Christmas from coming sort.

Sea Girt officials told News12 New Jersey that the vandals had targeted six places on the town's Christmas display, which was set to be lit up on Friday night. The lights were replaced, and the tree lighting went on as scheduled, News12 reported.

So did the search for the vandals. Sea Girt police searched for clues and reviewed security footage from nearby businesses in hopes of catching a glimpse that might reveal the vandals' identities.

The footage did reveal exactly that. And it wasn't what anyone expected.

In a Facebook post Saturday, Sea Girt police released photos of the vandal: One Eastern gray squirrel, who bit through the wires in an attempt to add the pretty bulbs to its store of nuts for the winter.

"The Sea Girt Police Department is proud to report that the case of our broken holiday lights has been solved. We are happy that no human acted as a grinch in this incident. The squirrel was "charged "with criminal mischief and released on bail," police said in the post.

If you look closely at the photos, you can see the culprit with a bulb in his mouth as he goes through the fence.

It made for some very good laughs.

Photos via Sea Girt Police Department