The mountain lion was caught in the Tesla’s headlights. Vladimir Polumiskov moved both quickly and slowly, not wanting to draw unwanted attention. He put his 2-year-old son back in the car seat and got behind the wheel and quietly closed the door.
His wife, Anastasiia Prokopenko, was in the passenger seat; she couldn’t believe what they were seeing. “No way. No way,” she said.
“Get in the car. Get in the car.” The family, just back from a sushi dinner on Tuesday night, had pulled into a parking space at their apartment complex off Barham Boulevard in the Hollywood Hills.
Living on the western edge of Griffith Park, they were accustomed to seeing wildlife — coyotes, bobcats, deer, foxes — wandering into their backyard. But a mountain lion was extreme. “We’re not getting out,” Prokopenko said.
Less than 13 feet away, the cat was sitting on the low-angled trunk of an oak tree, partly hidden by weeds, his blond coat set off by the bright lights. Polumiskov, 30, reached for his phone and started shooting video. “This guy was huge,” he said.
Though the sighting has not been confirmed by the National Park Service, which oversees the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area and has also studied wildlife in the 4,000 acres of Griffith Park, the possibility of a mountain lion making its home in this island wilderness may give many Angelenos a sense of déjà vu all over again. The mountain-lion king of Griffith Park — a cat known as P-22 — roamed .