Hi again,
We had a similar situation in the U.K. until the early seventies when the dangerous animal laws were tightened up. This meant that a license was needed proving not only sufficient knowledge, but also secure housing was needed to keep wild animals. This was a suprisingly common practice, one of the lions released by the late and great George Adamson was a male rescued from a furniture store in London by two Australians living there at the time!!
Since these laws were brought in rather abruptly and would of meant great cost to many people who kept unlicensed animals an awful lot of them were shot, or released to their chances.
A lady I knew when I was a child, an amazing animal sculptor, Di Francis had tape recordings of big cats calling and had photographic evidence of them living wild on Bodmin moor in Cornwall. I believe she wrote a couple of books on the subject (I'll have to look them now I've been reminded of them, thanks!). Farmers used to report big cat kills regularly, although the cats still seem to be around they have learned to keep away from livestock, or the press is just bored of reporting it. There are many other places in the U.K. that report the same thing.