Tavares was born in 1966, the youngest of four children, to Ann and Daniel Tavares Sr., who was an officer in the
US Navy. His parents divorced when he was four years old, and his father moved to
Florida and remarried, leaving Daniel and his siblings to be raised by their single mother. Tavares dropped out of school in the eighth grade and was first arrested at age 19 for an
assault committed during an overnight
burglary. A friend of the Tavares family wrote to the judge that Tavares was a "very sincere and honest young man" and said, "I do not believe that you will see this person in your court again once this ordeal is over." Subsequently, Tavares was sentenced to one year of
probation, and months later, he was charged with
trespassing and possession of
marijuana and received another five months of probation. Months later, he was charged with
robbery and given a prison sentence for violating his probation conditions. He would be charged several more times throughout the mid- to late 1980s for drug possession,
disorderly conduct, and
larceny. In 1988, Tavares moved to Florida with his father, whom he had not seen since his early childhood. His father tried to get him counseling for his drug addiction and got him a job as an apprentice
welder. His attempts at rehabilitating his son failed when Tavares was caught with a stolen checkbook. He later returned to his mother's home in
Massachusetts. Tavares's mental health quickly deteriorated, and he was using several pharmaceutical drugs, including
fluphenazine, a drug used to treat
schizophrenia. ==Murders and imprisonment==