Homeless Man Sets Himself On Fire During Hoboken St. Patrick's Bar Crawl

HOBOKEN, N.J. (CBSNewYork/AP) -- A homeless man set himself on fire on a Hoboken street near where hundreds of revelers were hopping bar to bar for an annual St. Patrick's pub crawl, police said.

Police Chief Kenneth Ferrante told NJ.com that police received a call about 11 p.m. Saturday that a man was trying to set himself on fire. Responding officers found the man with his jacket on fire and shouted for him to get to the ground so they could extinguish it, but he refused.

Once the fire spread, the man started screaming and officers were able to push him to the ground to put out the blaze, police said. The man was not seriously injured, Ferrante said.

An annual St. Patrick's Day bar crawl had started at 11 a.m., drawing hundreds of partiers to over 20 bars in the neighborhood.