‘Most horrible four days’: Las Vegas motorcyclist remembered at vigil — PHOTOS
If Jordon Dodder had attended his own vigil, he would have been cracking jokes, according to his wife, Kelly Dodder.
The corner of Russell and Lindell roads was packed with family and friends gathered for a candlelight vigil Sunday night to remember the 37-year-old father, who died in a crash at the intersection Wednesday morning.
He was riding his motorcycle when he was struck by another vehicle, killing him and turning his wife’s world “upside-down,” according to a GoFundMe created to support the family. The page, which raised almost $28,000 as of Sunday evening, said Dodder was a veteran and had a deep love for motorcycles.
“This has been the most horrible four days of my life,” Kelly Dodder said Sunday as she thanked the large group for showing up and supporting her. “Every morning I wake up — and I get up at in the middle of the night — thinking he’s going to be there for us.”
Kelly Dodder is a teacher at Mannion Middle School who was awarded the Clark County School District’s Educator of the Year Award in the 2015-2016 school year. The loss of her husband has left her to take care of one son, two step-daughters and a daughter the couple shared.
Kevin Irani, who worked with Jordon Dodder doing security at The Strat, described him as his best friend.
“He was the type of guy who lived his entire life with full integrity,” Irani said. “He knew what was right and he knew what was wrong. He excelled at what’s right, and he never even did what was wrong.”
Kelly Dodder also shared a story she said she tells her students every year. She said she once woke at 4 a.m. to find her husband was on his way to the hospital after fending off someone with nunchucks at The Strat. He went to the hospital with a large bruise on the side of his face, but he remained proud of the protection he had offered.
“He could not be more specific: ‘I did not go down,’” Kelly Dodder remembered her husband saying.
Irani also said that Jordon Dodder was one of the few veterans he knew who lived such a happy life.
“He was happy, and he lived a good life, and he died happy,” his father, Greg Dodder, said.
Greg Dodder said that his son had dark moments but that Kelly Dodder was the “light that came into his life.”
Jordon Dodder’s death marks one of the latest traffic-related deaths in the Metropolitan Police Department’s jurisdiction. More than 50 people have died in traffic-related crashes so far this year.
“Hopefully we’ll get to a point where we can remember all the good, and we don’t have to think back to the fact that this even happened,” Kelly Dodder said.
Contact Katie Futterman at kfutterman@reviewjournal.com. Follow @ktfutts on X and @katiefutterman.bsky.social.
