You have to see this! Sanitation worker shocked to find man police were searching for hiding in garbage can
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SURPRISE! — An Ohio sanitation worker was preparing to dump a garbage can into a garbage truck when he found a man, who’d been running from police, hiding inside the trash can.
The shocking incident was captured on a police dashcam on Feb. 23, 2026, and has since gone viral.
Huber Heights Police said in a Facebook post that an officer initiated a traffic stop but upon stopping the vehicle, the driver fled on foot. The officer “briefly lost sight of the suspect and quickly established a perimeter in the area.”
Dashcam footage shows the sanitation worker pushing a garbage can over to the garbage truck. The worker then opens the lid and when he looks into the can, he sees the man inside.
The shocked sanitation worker immediately backs away from the can then looks at the officer in the police car that was nearby and begins jumping and pointing to the garbage can. As the officer drives towards the garbage can, the suspect pokes his head out then hops out of the trash can and takes off running.
The officer begins chasing after the suspect, who in the process of making his getaway, lost both shoes.
“As luck would have it, ‘Oscar the Grouch’ — as we’ve nicknamed our suspect — appeared at just the right place and the right time,” the police department wrote on Facebook. “Thanks to the impressive athletic ability and swift response of our very own Officer Perez, the suspect was safely apprehended.”
The suspect was taken into custody. The police department said nobody was injured in the incident.
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