UPDATE: Mountain lion shot, killed in Mount Shasta - Mount Shasta Herald
Police officers shot and killed a mountain lion near Mount Shasta Elementary School Wednesday evening after it snagged a cat from a resident's doorstep and showed no fear of humans.
Mount Shasta police officer Robert Gibson and sergeant Joe Restine responded to the situation around 8:30 p.m. on Sept. 28 and killed the cat about 30 minutes later.
Angelica Rodriguez, who lives on Cedar Street across from the school said she was stepping out her back door and her cat, Kitara, was following her.
"She was running after me and I saw something rush out from the side to get her," Rodriguez recounted Thursday morning. "I thought it was a Great Dane, so I went to kick it, but when I saw the paw, I realized what it was, slammed the door and screamed."
Rodriguez wasn't quick enough to grab Kitara, however, and her cat was carried off by the lion.
She immediately called 911.
Gibson, who was first on the scene, drove past the school, turned around, then spotted the lion standing on the corner of Cedar and West Jessie streets, he said.
"It just stood there looking at me with the cat in its mouth. Then it walked over and laid down in this yard," Gibson said, pointing to Lolly Spini's house, which is just one house north from the school.
After calling the Department of Fish and Game, Gibson and Restine decided the animal was dangerous because of its lack of fear and close proximity to humans.}
The choice was made to put it down, said police chief Parish Cross.
Gibson said they couldn't shoot the lion where it was, but when the cat jumped over the fence into Spini's backyard, they made three safe and clear shots with an M16.
Gibson said the shots didn't kill the lion, who dropped the cat and retreated further into the yard. The officers then went around the house to the alleyway Spini shares with the school.
Entering the yard through the back gate, they saw the cat sitting under an apple tree, its eyes glowing in the glare of their flashlights only 10 to 15 feet away.
Officers shot 11 times with their handguns before the lion died, Gibson said. It continued walking through several of the shots, he added.
"We couldn't risk an injured mountain lion running through town," he explained Thursday afternoon as he went over the scene in the daylight.
Spini's next door neighbor Rhonda Monaghan said she and her husband had just exited their hot tub on their back porch when the commotion began. She saw Gibson and Restine's flashlights and watched things from her back bedroom window.
Ron and Gloria Cooper, who live next door to Rodriguez, said they heard the gunshots but didn't know what they were. They said their own cat was acting strangely and refused to go outside.
Though they're sad the lion had to be killed, Gloria said she feels safer knowing it won't be lurking around their house anymore.
Monaghan said she's been seeing mountain lion footprints around her home for the past five to six months and is also relieved the cat won't be back.
"I was more worried for the officers' safety," she said Thursday afternoon.
Rodriguez said after everything died down, her boyfriend went across the street to get their cat, and they buried it soon afterward.
Personnel from the DFG took the mountain lion – a female that weighed between 80 and 100 pounds, Gibson estimated – and will be performing a necropsy in the near future.
30 Sep, 2011--
Source: http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNG1JjSlpox-Z9KwJR8LWKxtyPX-qQ&url=http://www.mtshastanews.com/features/x1461786389/Mountain-lion-shot-killed-in-Mount-Shasta
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