David Thibodeau

David or Dave Thibodeau was a Branch Davidian, a survivor of the Waco siege, and a musician. He was born in Bangor, Maine. In early adulthood, Thibodeau sought to become a musician in Los Angeles, California, where he converted to Branch Davidianism after meeting David Koresh in a Guitar Center in 1990. In the late 1980s, he attended the Musicians Institute of Technology. At the Mount Carmel Center near Waco, Texas, Thibodeau married Michele Jones upon Koresh's request. Thibodeau was present at the Mt. Carmel compound on 28 February 1993, when the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) conducted a botched raid. He stayed for the 51-day siege until escaping the fire that consumed the compound with eight other survivors. In 1999, he co-authored a memoir called A Place Called Waco: A Survivor's Story with Leon Whiteson, a Zimbabwe-born novelist, critic, and architect. Thibodeau runs a website called "Waco Survivors," in which he archives media related to the Waco siege. He (re-)married in 1997 and has at least one daughter. In 2018, the miniseries Waco aired featuring Rory Culkin playing David Thibodeau and Thibodeau himself in a cameo role as an unnamed character. Thibodeau is a drummer for the band The Blast Addicts, and he resided in Texas as of 2020. He played drums for other bands after the Waco siege as well like Grooviest Maximus.