Mountain lion strolls through front door of home, coming face-to-face with man

By Tim Caputo

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    LA VERNE, California (KABC) — A family is speaking out after their La Verne home got an unexpected visit from a mountain lion. The front door was wide open, so the big cat made itself right at home.

Now, La Verne neighbors are being told to be on high alert for roaming animals. It isn’t necessarily a neighborhood high in the mountains or deep in the woods. Neighbors say there were kids’ parties going on while the big cat roamed.

There are unwelcome house guests, and then there’s this — a mountain lion strutting through the front door of a La Verne home.

Jeff Tenney was in the kitchen of his mother’s house on Saturday afternoon when the big cat just strolled in.

“Then out of the corner of my eye, I hear and see and feel the large presence,” he said.

Tenney says the moment only lasted a second, but he was standing a few feet away from a potentially ferocious wild animal.

“Peaked around the corner of the dining room, and we locked eyes for a moment, and I knew it was a lion,” Tenney said.

That moment only lasted a second because the mountain lion wasn’t interested in remaining a house cat and instead, darted out the back door.

“As soon as it saw me, it went straight through the screen here, out the back. It was a loud, loud noise, boom! And into the pool and over the fence,” Tenney recalled.

The mountain lion even popped a pool float during its daring escape out of the backyard.

Then, Tenney ran out front.

“I wasn’t scared. I was generally just, ultimately thinking about my dog, who was in the front yard,” he said.

It was the middle of the afternoon, and Tenney’s 13-year-old dog Bandit was sunbathing in the front yard, but the big cat never noticed him, and Bandit didn’t notice the mountain lion either. Tenney said he was sound asleep.

“He was napping right here in the front lawn, so he was snoozing. By the time I came out here, he was up and kind of walking around, like he caught a scent or something, but never saw the mountain lion. It came from the driveway, and they didn’t meet each other, but sure passed pretty close, but slept through the entire thing,” Tenney said.

The house where the close encounter happened is in the middle of the Rancho La Verne neighborhood, which is not exactly right at the foothills. That’s why Tenney is sharing his story and the video of the mountain lion walking inside, to let those who live around the area know to keep their eyes peeled.

“We have the Ring camera footage to notify the community. There were lots of kids running around that day, lots of parties going on, so we wanted to make sure we have that footage and alert the community,” Tenney said.

In case you’re curious, the front door was open in the first place for Bandit to go in and out of the house as he pleased. But now, Bandit won’t be sunbathing in the front yard for the foreseeable future.

So far, no other neighbors have spotted the mountain lion.

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