‘Santa-Antics’: MA Man Fleeing Police Gets Stuck In Chimney [Video]

FALL RIVER, MA — A Fall River man trying to escape arrest got stuck in a chimney Tuesday and his “Santa-antics” landed him in the hospital for evaluation before he was medically cleared to face a “slew of charges,” police said in a seasonally inspired statement on Facebook.

Police in Fall River, located about 55 miles south of Boston, were serving a search warrant at a residence at 127 Canal St. when two men inside fled via the rooftop. One of the two men jumped from the roof onto a car below and escaped.

The other man, later identified as Robert Langlais, 33, “invoked the essence of the seasonal icon and attempted to hide inside a chimney,” police said. “Langlais quickly became stuck in the chimney and required the assistance of the very detectives he was previously fleeing from.”

Police, fire and emergency crews who had to break through the bricks to free the man, according to body cam footage police posted on Facebook that also shows the man who escaped by jumping off the roof.

At the 1:09 minute mark, a passerby told police he had been walking his dog and heard the man scream. “Yeah, yeah he went down the chimney,” he said.

“He’s in the chimney?” an officer responded, then to other officers, “Hey, he’s in the chimney.”

“What chimney? … How do you do that?” another responded,

When police demanded that Langlais show his hands, he responded, “I can’t.”

After he was rescued, Langlais was checked out at a local hospital, but arrested on drug possession charges and “a slew of charges from outstanding warrants,” the post said.

Also arrested on drug charges, but “with less theatrics,” was Tanisha Ibay, 32, police said.

(Fall River Police Department body cam video)