Back before WW2 a young woman in southern California somehow got custody of a lion cub and raised it at home. There's some wonderful old newsreel footage of her lion riding in a rumble seat, sitting beside a lamb, and wrestling with his keeper. But, no matter how attached a wild animal may be to the person who raises it, it will mature and become independent, a slave to it's reflexes and hormones. And, in the case of a lion, very dangerous. He lived out his life in a southern California zoo. After a few years, he no longer seemed to recognbize his old friend.

Mr. Yates is lucky he was caught. Had his tiger killed him, it would certainly have been put down.