Army veteran run over by EIGHT vehicles after falling from his motorcycle on his 26th birthday, as family questions how he was struck so many times: ‘He’s not a deer in the …
- John ‘Jack’ Dyer was struck by eight vehicles after falling from his bike west of Orlando on his 26th birthday
- All the drivers stopped for police but each claimed not to have known the former paratrooper was in the road
- ‘How did all of those cars just keep running him over?’ demanded father John Dyer Snr, ‘he’s not a deer in the road, he is a human being’
By Dominic Yeatman For Dailymail.Com[1]
Published: 05:38, 1 January 2024 | Updated: 05:45, 1 January 2024
The father of a decorated Army veteran who died on his 26th birthday has spoken of his ‘nightmare’ after learning that eight vehicles ran over him without stopping.
John ‘Jack’ Dyer lost control of his motorcycle on US Highway 27 west of Orlando at around 6.30pm on December 17, hitting the ground in the center southbound travel lane.
By the time the former paratrooper was found, he had been repeatedly struck by passing drivers, all seemingly unaware they had just hit a person, the Florida[2] Highway Patrol (FHP) said.
‘The first car probably killed him. I don’t think he suffered, but how did all of those cars just keep running him over?’ said father John Dyer Snr, who also lost a daughter during the Covid pandemic.
‘He’s not a deer in the road, he is a human being.’
John ‘Jack’ Dyer was a decorated member of the 82nd Airborne Division before his honorable discharge in March of 2023
Devastated father John Dyer Snr described the experience as a ‘nightmare’, ‘it’s horrendous, it’s just crushing,’ he said, ‘God chose Jack’s time.
He didn’t ask me, that’s for sure’
‘Jack said, ‘My grandfather was an immigrant, and I’m an immigrant, and all immigrants should serve their country,’ John Snr said.
Hours earlier John Snr and his wife Elizabeth had texted their son a happy birthday, but their messages and a voicemail from the mother went unanswered.
Two days later, officers from Suffolk County Police knocked on the door of their home in New York.
‘They asked for the family of John Dyer,’ John Snr told Fox News[3].
‘I assumed he got a ticket or something and then they told me he died in a motorcycle accident.’
‘It’s devastating, I didn’t know how to tell my wife.’
John Jnr was adopted as a five-year-old from Russia and joined his new family in New York, where his dad worked as a firefighter with NYFD before joining a hospital as a reregistered nurse.
John Jr was just five-years-old when he was adopted by the family and moved to New York from his native Russia
They took him to Disney World after he told them that children in Russia were assured there was no such place.
‘They told him in Russia it was just a made-up thing.
When he came and we took him to that, he was enraptured,’ John Snr said.
‘He was just so excited. We couldn’t hold him, he ran after Mickey Mouse.’
John Jr was so taken with the experience that he moved to Orlando when he turned 19 and got a job as a security officer for Disney World.
But his ambitions did not stop with Mickey Mouse and in 2019 he enrolled as a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division, after being scared of heights as a boy.
‘I don’t know how he does it, he just overcame his fears,’ his father said.
‘He was afraid of the water, and then he became an avid surfer out in Montauk, Long Island. He was full of life.
‘Jack said, ‘My grandfather was an immigrant, and I’m an immigrant, and all immigrants should serve their country,’ John Snr said.
‘So he said, ‘I’m going in’.
The young paratrooper was honorably discharged in March and still living in the state when the tragedy struck.
FHP say all eight drivers stopped when requested, and the case remains an active traffic homicide investigation.
‘He was afraid of the water, and then he became an avid surfer out in Montauk, Long Island,’ his father said, ‘he was full of life’
‘He was proud to be an American and serve his country’ his parents said on his tribute page
‘People tell me he was the most polite, well-mannered young man they’ve met,’ his father said
The spot on US Highway 27 west of Orlando at the intersection with Frank Jarrell Road
John’s family was preparing for Christmas without his sister Katy after her death just two years ago when they received their latest devastating news.
‘It’s a nightmare, it’s horrendous, it’s just crushing,’ John Snr said.
‘People tell me he was the most polite, well-mannered young man they’ve ever met, and he was good.
He was honest and caring and we are very proud of him.
‘God doesn’t tell us when we have a full life.
You can have a full life when you are one month old, or a full life when you’re 99.
‘God chose Jack’s time.
He didn’t ask me, that’s for sure.’