An alleged tiger sighting near the University of Cincinnati campus Monday has Cincinnatians asking: Could this be real?

Toni Jackson, who works at the school, told Enquirer media partner Fox 19 she and her supervisor called police after she saw a tiger walking near the campus early Monday morning. A group of UC students also claimed to police they saw a tiger outside their apartment near Burnett Woods.

Police did not find a tiger and there haven’t been any more sightings. Big cats, however, have shown up in cities in the past.

Tiger sightings: Where have they happened in the US?

In 2023, a tiger was found near Dallas as part of an investigation into a rooster and dog fighting operation. Dallas police found the big cat in a cage, and it was taken to the Dallas Zoo to be evaluated, ABC 8 (WFAA-TV) reported.

That same year, police officers in New Mexico discovered a healthy, young Bengal tiger cub while responding to reports of a shooting.

The search for an alleged tiger at an Albuquerque man’s home in 2022 led police to find a different exotic animal: an alligator. In the raid, police also seized pounds of drugs, $40,000 in cash and 17 guns.

Perhaps one of the most infamous examples is Ming, a 425-pound tiger found in 2003 inside a Harlem apartment. Police also discovered an alligator living inside Antoine Yates’ apartment, and he was sentenced to five months in prison for reckless endangerment.

Ming spent the rest of his days at the Noah’s Lost Ark Animal Sanctuary in Berlin Center, Ohio, where he died in 2019.

How many tigers are kept as pets?

Owning a tiger is illegal in Ohio, but laws on big cat ownership vary greatly by state.

Websites drive the majority of today’s wildlife trafficking, which is the second biggest threat to endangered species after habitat loss, according to the World Wildlife Fund. The organization says it takes less than a minute “to find internationally protected” animals online with just one search term.

Experts with World Wildlife Fund also told CNN in 2021 there were more captive tigers in the United States than in the wild. Only about 6% of those tigers were kept at accredited zoos, with the majority living in people’s backyards as pets, at breeding facilities or as attractions at small theme parks.

“They should not be kept as pets and certainly do not belong in a home,” Michelle Curley, communications director for the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden, wrote in an email to The Enquirer. As an accredited zoo, Curley said the Cincinnati Zoo supports the Big Cat Public Safety Act, which protects against private ownership of tigers and other exotic animals.

“In addition to safety concerns, a tiger would cost a fortune to feed and would most likely destroy your house,” Curley added.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Tiger on the loose in Cincinnati? They’ve popped up in other cities