A Florida dad met with his lawyer and visited a priest to be baptized hours before police said he threw his 5-year-old daughter off a bridge on Thursday morning, WTSP-TV reported.
John Nicholas Jonchuck Jr., 25, went to the office of Family First Law Group lawyer Genevieve Torres on Wednesday and said he was God and the creator, according to a 911 call the lawyer made after Jonchuck left. Torres said the father demanded she read the Bible to him in Swedish, the station reported.
"He's nuts," Torres told the dispatcher. "He's out of his mind, and he has a minor child with him, [and is] driving to a church now. I should have kept the child (here)."
Torres said she was supposed to file paperwork for a case for Jonchuck, who was a new client.
"And he's like, 'Well, don't file the paperwork. It's not going to matter anymore,'" Torres told the dispatcher.
Later Wednesday, Jonckuck called St. Paul's Catholic Church asking to join the congregation and to be baptized, Father Bill Swengros told WTSP-TV.
"He called for an appointment and came to see me," Swengros said.
Jonchuck showed up with his daughter and spoke with the priest. The dad admitted to having mental health issues but the first half hour of the meeting passed without incident, Swengros said.
"He was anxious agitated but not threatening in any way," the priest said. "He wasn't presently under medication."
Police arrived at the church and also determined the father was not a danger to anyone or himself, the priest said. But after Jonchuck left, he returned two hours later with his mother and demanded to be baptized immediately.
Swengros said they don't perform them and suggested he find another church.
By 12 a.m. Thursday, Jonchuck was speeding at 100 miles per hour on the Dick Misener Bridge, according to a St. Petersburg officer who saw his Chrysler PT Cruiser. The father stopped the car, got out and threw his 5-year-old daughter over the bridge, police said.
Investigators are still trying to determine a motive for the alleged killing. He is being held without bond at the Pinellas County Jail.
