ST. LUCIE COUNTY — A 25-year-old Fort Pierce resident was killed Saturday night in a three-vehicle accident in northern St. Lucie County, according to a Florida Highway Patrol report.

Juan Alberto Lopez was northbound on King’s Highway just before 10 p.m. when he lost control of his vehicle about 500 feet south of Palomar Parkway and crossed into the southbound lane into the path of two vehicles, according to the report.

The first vehicle, driven by Port St. Lucie resident Lacy Catherine Mahon, 17, swerved and hit the left front of Lopez’ vehicle. Mahon and her passenger, Fort Pierce resident Taryn M. Horvath, also 17, sustained minor injuries.
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Theresa Caputo of Stuart, in black, hugs another woman Wednesday at the scene of a memorial that was built along Cove Road near Stuart. Caputo, a mother of three, said her children all knew and grew up with those killed. (DEBORAH SILVER/Treasure Coast Newspapers)

A few teenagers in board shorts and T-shirts lifted their sunglasses just long enough to wipe away their tears and hug one another in the grass along Cove Road Wednesday afternoon as they stood above a swelling memorial site.

Amid her tears, a mother bent down, reached through the letters, flowers and mementos and clutched a golf ball in her hand.

Angela Coady said she knew one of her son Nick’s friends had put it there intending for it to stay, but when she saw it she decided she had to take it with her.

“The last time I saw him he was going to play golf. He was happy as a lark,” she said. “The next time I saw him, he was dead.”

Nick Coady, 18, and his friends — Christopher Harold Briglio, 18, and Connor William Graver, 16, — were all killed early Tuesday when the Jeep Grand Cherokee that Coady was driving slammed into the back of a John Deere truck and overturned.

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A Hobe Sound man died after apparently losing control of his motorcycle shortly before 1 a.m. Sunday.

Charles E. Thompson, 42, was killed in the accident that occurred on Southeast Seabranch Boulevard, about two miles west of U.S. 1, according to a Florida Highway Patrol release, TCPalm.com reported.

Thompson was driving his 1986 Honda east on Southeast Seabranch Boulevard when he reportedly lost control of the motorcycle, struck a curb and traveled onto the grass median. The motorcycle then struck a large tree and Thompson was thrown off, hitting a tree, according to the report.