Greetings

To celebrate the holidays, I'm taking a break from our weekly list of quirky news stories to bring you an update on a story I first told you about in the first week of December.

I'm writing, of course, about the now international story concerning the raccoon who broke into a Virginia liquor store one night and was found the next morning, passed out in the bathroom. Since then, there have been two additional stories concerning the raccoon who has become known as Trashed Panda. The first comes from police reports, where Trashed Panda is now the prime suspect in a pair of earlier break-ins in the same shopping center: one in a karate studio, and another in the local DMV, where some snacks went missing.

The second comes from the sale of Trashed Panda shirts and sweatshirts to benefit the Hanover (VA) County Animal Protection and Shelter, who sent the animal control officer who took the now famous photo of the passed out Trashed Panda. By December 2025, the animal control center had raised close to $300,000 for the renovation and expansion of its building, which will allow it to help more animals.