ST. PETERSBURG — In many ways, Christopher Theriault lived a normal life. He had worked several jobs, including bagging groceries and working with his uncle.
He loved science-fiction movies, especially the Star Wars trilogy, and watched the Discovery Channel faithfully.
But a substantial part of Mr. Theriault's life was not normal. He sometimes behaved erratically in public, clapping his hands and smiling at the sky, as if he were talking to someone.
He complained of hearing unwanted voices coming out of radios and television sets. Sometimes he broke things to shut them up.
Mr. Theriault died Monday after lying down in front of a bus, according to the Florida Highway Patrol. His family and caregivers dispute that account and believe Mr. Theriault must have fallen. He was 37.
He grew up in the Lealman and Kenneth City area and had little contact with his biological father, who left when the boy was 3.
Teachers called him a slow learner, but Mr. Theriault had an excellent mind, his family said.
He could watch a program about how rockets are made and repeat it from memory. Especially, he enjoyed reciting the Abbott and Costello bit "Who's on first?"
At 18, he changed his last name from Kelly to Theriault to honor his grandfather, who had died a month earlier. That's about the same time his family began noticing some odd behavior.
"Voices," said Robert Theriault, his uncle. "Lots of voices."
He would report having seen his grandfather. When he hurt his shoulder on the job, he told his family that police had inflicted the injury.
"The biggest thing he used to tell me a lot was that even when he had his TV off, he thought the devil was talking to him through the TV," said his stepbrother, Shawn Finch, 32.
"Anything that talked to him, he broke," said Mr. Theriault's grandmother, Iris Theriault, 74. "You could buy him a radio once a month."
For nearly 20 years now, authorities have given his condition a name: paranoid schizophrenia.
The diagnosis made him eligible for social services, where he got the medications that stabilized his moods. But his erratic behavior became more frequent over time. He was Baker Acted and taken to Personal Enrichment for Mental Health Services.
"Now it was getting to be too frequent, too often, too whatever," said his mother, Jean Finch, 56.
In November, his family placed him in Loving Care of St. Petersburg, an assisted living facility. He was doing well there and taking his medications, his mother said.
The facility allows residents to come and go as they please, as long as they sign out whenever they leave. Mr. Theriault did that at about 8 a.m. Monday, said Loving Care Administrator Graham Harte.
At 1:06 p.m., according to troopers, witnesses saw Mr. Theriault kneeling on the west shoulder of 49th Street N as a southbound Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority bus approached 58th Avenue N.
"Based on the preliminary information, it was more methodical, not that he jumped in front of it. He just stepped off the curb, laid down in the middle of the road and got run over by the bus," said Sgt. Larry Kraus of the Florida Highway Patrol. "It didn't appear that he tripped."
Mr. Theriault's family and administrators at Loving Care don't believe it and say Mr. Theriault must have fallen. On Sunday, the day before he died, he had gone fishing with his stepfather and to a Rays game.
"We can't make sense of what happened and why it happened," said Robert Theriault, 55. "But we can say this: He's in a better place now."
Times researcher Carolyn Edds contributed to this story.Andrew Meacham can be reached at (727) 892-2248 or ameacham@sptimes.com.
>>Biography
Christopher Allen Theriault
Born: June 4, 1972.
Died: July 13, 2009.
Survivors: mother, Jean Finch; stepfather Ralph Finch; grandmother Iris Theriault; stepbrother Shawn Finch; numerous extended family members.
Service: 11 a.m. Friday, Royal Palm North Funeral Home, 2600 Gandy Blvd. N.
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