This is the moment ‘Oscar the Grouchy Racoon’ sticks his head out of a litter bin and gives himself up after the cops come calling with a search warrant.

The funny scene was filmed in the city of Auburn Hills in Oakland County located in the US state of Michigan over the weekend, and the footage was shared by the police on 18th April.

After serving the bin intruder with a search warrant, the cops said the “bandit” gave himself up without further incident.

The Auburn Hills Police Department (AHPD) stated: “Here is actual video of a search warrant our Officers served this weekend. The bandit surrendered without incident.”

The police included the message with the hashtags ‘Search Warrant’ and ‘Trash Panda’.

In the footage, an AHPD officer is seen tentatively approaching the rubbish bin before knocking on the top three times and announcing: “Police department, search warrant.”

The cop then turns on his heels and runs away as the furry bin intruder gives up the game and surrenders with his paws in full view of the arresting officers.

Facebook user ‘Kimberly Craig WXYZ’ commented: “The AHPD wins the intergalactic internet today!”

Netizen ‘Susie Powell’ said: “Smokey and the Bandit!”

With their black mask making them look like criminals racoons (Procyon lotor) that are native to North America are often referred to as bandits. They have also recently started to appear in some parts of Europe and Japan.

They usually live in wooden areas with abundant vegetation where they can have easy access to water, where they can travel up to 18 miles from their den in order to find food.

Racoons are omnivores and they usually feed on fresh vegetation and wildlife like for example, birds, eggs, fish, frogs, and fruit, or in this case by raiding the rubbish.

When they live in urban areas they do not go further than one mile from their den while searching for food, so, their diet consists of everything they can find. Another reason why they can be seen invading trash cans and eating human food.

They usually spend the winter sleeping in their dens, while in spring, summer and autumn they are the most active.

They live in communities of four to five racoons in order to better protect themselves from predators and communicate with each other by using more than 200 different sounds.

They have good access to food and shelter since they are good climbers, and the dexterity they possess gives them the ability to open jars, doors or bottles as well as climb into bins to sort for food scraps.