'Stuffed behind bars': From inside giant teddy bears to cubby holes - thieves' bizarre hiding spots

manchestereveningnews.co.uk:

It’s hardly surprising that thieves want to hide when they hear the blues and twos of police cars. The flashing lights and loud sirens are enough to make any criminal want to run away.

Yet, some will try their hardest to stay hidden in plain sight.

Whether it’s an off-the-cuff decision to jump into a bin, or a well thought out ruse to stuff themselves into a giant teddy bear… police have time-and-time-again caught them in the act.

READ MORE: Man 'brazenly' drives away from court moments after being banned from road

Often captured on bodycam, when their creative and somewhat strange refuge is discovered, they are left red-faced.

Here, the Manchester Evening News looks back on five of the most bizarre choices for hiding spots which were rumbled by police.

Hidden in a wall?

"It's fair to say we'll quite literally go through walls to catch those that we're after!" say police, who captured the unexpected moment a man was found hiding in a wall to evade officers who arrived to arrest him.

In bizarre body camera footage, police investigate what appears to be the kitchen of a home in the Southdene area of Kirkby, Merseyside, in January last year.

Officers from Wigan's District Tasking Team take a knife to a small opening, above a shelf and counter top inside one of the walls. They then prise open what is revealed to be a door to a tiny cubby hole.

Suddenly, a forehead appears, popping up in the dark space.

Emerging on his hands from the tight cupboard, a man - wearing only his underpants - crawls forward, past bottles of cleaning spray and bleach, and into the waiting arms of police who haul him down from the counter and arrest him.

The 32-year-old man was wanted for a string of offences - including two domestic