Lacy, a former Sausalito resident, lived in Corning, about two hours north of Sacramento. Lacy was a freelance computer programmer who used the Internet to look for work and for dates. In his resume, he claims to have done contract work for several companies, including eBay. No confirmation from that company, but the ABC7 News I-Team reached one business owner who confirms he hired Lacy last year for a four-month, full-time stint.
"I remember sort of feeling like, 'Wow, I'm not sure whether I trust him exactly or not,'" Dave Glende said.
Glende says he had concerns about Lacy, but could not quite figure out why.
"Sometimes you can sort of tell when people have, you know, they seem to be all nice and conversational and everything, but you can tell underneath that they're...angry, I would say," he said.
Lacy's father tells ABC7 News that he and his wife saw mental health problems emerge in their son from an early age, growing up in Bend, Oregon.
"Sometimes we would talk to him and he'd be very engaging and other times he would be, you know, just kind of depressed and not wanting to talk or just kind of crawl inside himself," Craig Lacy said.
Craig Lacy says his son suffered a psychotic break his senior year at San Francisco State University.
"He was, like, hallucinating and, and he was very paranoid and, you know they, he was in the hospital and they diagnosed him as being bipolar and they put him on lithium," he said.
Chris Lacy graduated in 2005 with a 3.79 GPA, and then moved to a duplex in Sausalito. He got a hunting license that same year.
"I never saw him use a hand gun before, no," Craig Lacy said. "But he was, he was a pretty good shot with a shotgun and, and a bow."
Lacy's resume says he moved from Sausalito last year to near Chico "and started a small/farm/homestead" to "sell the produce online and to customers in the Bay area." He wrote, "I also contribute significant time to the Ron Paul campaign and the liberty movement."
Even with his mental health history and his access to guns, those who knew Chris Lacy cannot comprehend how and why he wound up in that highway shootout with a CHP officer.
"There's nothing in me that would, I would think that would happen with Chris," Glende said.
Craig Lacy says he had not talked to his son in a year and a half. He said Chris could be very charming and friendly and he didn't consider him to be a violent person.
Kira Klapper contributed to this report.
