Oregon Standoff Ends Peacefully After ‘Roomba Stuck In Bathroom’ Taken Into Custody

WASHINGTON COUNTY, OR. (THECOUNT) — A tense Washington, Oregon standoff ended with police safely taking a “Roomba” robotic vacuum into custody.

Deputies say they responded to a 911 call for a “burglary in progress” at an Oregon woman’s home and ended up catching the culprit – a battery powered vacuum that had become trapped in the homeowner’s bathroom.

The initial call came in from someone reporting that a stranger was in her bathroom, and that the person had the bathroom door locked. She said she could see shadows moving under the door.

Within minutes several deputies surround the home, calling for a K9 team as backup. They say they could hear a rustling noise coming from the bathroom.

After calling to the “suspect” several times over a loudspeaker, deputies went into the home with their guns drawn. After opening the bathroom door, deputies say they found an automated robot vacuum crashing around on the floor, reports KATU.

“As we entered the home we could hear rustling in the bathroom. We made several announcements and the ‘rustling’ became more frequent. We breached the bathroom door and encountered a very thorough vacuuming job being done by a Roomba Robotic Vacuum cleaner,” the Washington County Sheriff’s Deputy Rogers wrote in his report of the incident.

No word on whether deputies filed charges in the incident, but the suspect’s record appears to be clean.