Police in Blackpool are seeking a thief who 'looks like Ross from Friends'

Updated Thursday 25th October - David Schwimmer has responded! See below.

A Blackpudlian with a strong thirst for lager has unwittingly found viral fame after the Blackpool police posted a CCTV photo on Facebook of him appearing to rob a crate of cans, leading everyone to point out that he bears a strong resemblance to Ross from Friends – or at least his doppelganger Russ....

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The Lancashire Constabulary even got involved in the banter, commenting that they had confirmed "following a thorough investigation that David Schwimmer was in America on this date".

And now, David Schwimmer has responded, sharing a video on Twitter which confirms that he couldn't possibly have been robbing cans in Blackpool, because he was robbing cans in New York. Glad that's settled, then!

"Officers, I swear it wasn't me," the actor wrote. "As you can see, I was in New York. To the hardworking Blackpool police, good luck with the investigation. #Itwasntme."

The video shows Schwimmer shuffling out of a "convenience store" with a box of lager, taking a sheepish look at the camera - as the real perpetrator had done - as he passed." Check it out below.

In response to the original post on Facebook, user Billy Hewitt, spying an opportunity, commented: "I was going to read the report for this but it was 18 pages... FRONT AND BACK! It rambled on for so long that I fell aslEEP", referencing the season four episode of Friends in which Ross and Rachel fail to get their relationship back on track after he falls asleep reading her letter about their previous fallout.

And the Friends jokes didn't stop there. Here are the pick of the bunch:

Louise Lewis: "Lay off him. He grew up with Monica. IF YOU DIDNT EAT FAST YOU DIDNT EAT"

Rachel Louise Hutchinson: "It's not Ross.....It's Russ, he's trying to frame Ross to win back Rachel"

Heather Marie Wilson: "It’s NOT that common. It DOESN’T happen to every guy, and it IS A BIG DEAL!!!"

Spare a thought, however, for the poor shop-owner who is now down 24 cans of beer, and never likely to see this mysterious culprit brought to justice.

No one told him life was going to be this way...