Authorities believe the Bengal tiger that roamed loose in a residential area of Houston, Texas last Sunday night, is still in the city.
Houston Police Commander Ron Borza said at a news conference Friday that while officials "have not been lucky" to find the tiger, he believes it has not yet been transported out of the metropolitan area.
"I think that since Monday that tiger has probably been moved around six, seven or eight times to different places in the city,"
Borza said.
"I don't think he's out of Houston yet. Maybe out of the county, but I don't think so. I think he's still here."
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The event went viral by a video captured and posted by a neighbor that shows the tiger walking on the porch of the owner's home in Houston.
An agent who was on his day off and is a resident of the area asked the owner to keep the animal.
In the images, Víctor Hugo Cuevas, 26, is seen grabbing the feline by the neck to bring it into the house, while the policeman, who had been alerted to the event and had his weapon drawn, told him to reassure the animal.
After this incident,
Cuevas put the tiger in a white vehicle and fled for several hours until he was arrested last Monday morning.
, according to authorities.
Cuevas was charged with a felony for evading arrest, according to the Houston Police Department (HPD).
Cuevas was arrested again on Friday on an unrelated murder charge, involving an event that occurred in 2017. A judge in Fort Bend County revoked the defendant's bail on that charge, raising it to $ 300,000, according to the Houston Chronicle newspaper.
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On Friday, during the press conference and before Cuevas's bail hearing, Borza said the defendant has not cooperated in the search for the tiger.
"He and his lawyer are not cooperating," Borza said.
"Maybe if he goes to jail he will cooperate more with us. We will see."
Borza revealed that police have logged between 200 and 300 phone calls about the tiger, which is a nine-month-old male named India.
"We have been to a few places in Houston and we still haven't had any luck finding the tiger," added Borza.
Officials have also visited all businesses or individuals that are involved in the exotic animal trade in Houston to no avail, according to Borza.
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Cuevas' attorney, Michael W. Elliott, spoke to Fox News earlier this week.
According to him, locating the tiger and taking it to a good reserve, zoo or sanctuary is one of his main concerns at the moment.
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Cuevas has denied owning the cat, and his lawyer told Fox News that he is not necessarily the man who put the tiger in the truck and drove away.
In Cuevas' Instagram account, he is seen with a tiger, although his legal representative explained that those images do not prove that he owns the feline.
Houston Police Commander Ron Borza detailed in a news conference Monday that Cuevas apparently also had two monkeys in the house, something that is not illegal in Houston if the animal weighs less than 30 pounds (13.5 kilograms).
Tigers are not allowed within Houston city limits, police explained, unless whoever is in charge of the cat is licensed to keep exotic animals.
With information from EFE, Houston Chronicle and Fox News.
