http://www.cnn.com/2002/US/Northeast/12/22/offbeat.surfing.santa/index
.html

Border Patrol takes Santa into custody, briefly
Sunday, December 22, 2002 Posted: 8:46 PM EST (0146 GMT)

"Surfing Santa" plies the Niagara river just before the incident.

VIDEO
A wind-surfing Santa who crossed the Niagara River from Ontario,
Canada, to Buffalo, N.Y, is picked up by the U.S. Border Patrol
(December 22)

PLAY VIDEO

BUFFALO, New York (CNN) -- It wasn't quite as disturbing as grandma
getting run over by a reindeer, but, fortunately, few children were
around Sunday to witness Santa being taken into custody by the Border
Patrol of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service.

"Basically I entered the country illegally," admitted Ontario
businessman John Fulton, aka "Surfing Santa." He had just completed
his 18th annual crossing of the Niagara River between Fort Erie,
Canada, and Buffalo, New York when Border Patrol officers pulled him
aside, made him take off his Santa suit, patted him down, then put
him into a patrol car and drove off with him.

Fulton, 42, wasn't upset. "They wanted to make sure they followed the
new Homeland Security regulations ... I'm right behind what they did.
Post 9/11, this is the world we live in. For them, the publicity
stunt is good: 'We're not even going to let Santa Claus in the
country illegally.' "

"They were real nice guys," said the 5-foot 11-inch, 175-pound,
goateed Fulton. "They took me back to their headquarters there,
photographed me and fingerprinted me. I felt like an illegal alien. I
would have rather had my Santa suit on."

"Normally, in the past, you'd just touch down, then call in [to the
Border Patrol]. It used to be more lax," he said.


Fulton gestures to cameras as he's being taken into custody.



Fulton was released and returned to Canada after he proved who he was
and signed a declaration admitting he was in the United States
illegally.

"I didn't have any ID. We went to my Web site to show them," Surfing
Santa said.

Fulton said he had INS officials add to his paperwork that
the "subject inadvertently landed in the U.S. while performing
Surfing Santa duties."

Santa this year rode his substitute sleigh, a windsurf board, to
raise money for "Out Of The Cold," a non-profit organization for the
homeless, and the Resource Association for Teens (RAFT), a center for
troubled teens, both in St. Catharines, Ontario.