Hole in wall traps burglar

A Chinese burglar got stuck after he tried to crawl through a tiny opening built for a farmer's pet dog to steal some chickens.

The man had to be rescued by firefighters after he got stuck fast in the hole in a barn wall on the farm in Tianlin town, Guangxi province.

The burglar sneaked into the farm in the middle of the night - and thought he would be able to wriggle his way through the tiny opening.

"I underestimated the size of the hole and wrongly thought I could make it through," he later confessed to police officers.

He got stuck halfway through - and ended up trapped all night before finally being discovered the next morning, reports the Nanguo Morning Post.

Firefighters said the man was blue with cold and could hardly talk because he was shivering so badly by the time they arrived.

A fire service spokesman said: "It took us a good half-hour to carefully widen the hole to get him out. We had to go slowly because we were worried about the wall collapsing on top of him."

The burglar was arrested and is now in custody where he faces charges of attempted burglary.