SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) —
The family of the Utah bride killed by a drunk driver on her wedding night shared more about the 26-year-old and the crash.
Angelica Dhondup was killed leaving her wedding to her high school sweetheart. To her family she was known as “Jelly.” Her new husband and three children will go from her wedding to funeral in a matter of days.
“Even though we just barely got married, we used to tell each other that we were husband and wife – and no matter what, that we’d always be together forever,” said Tenzing Dhondup, Jelly’s husband, and now widower.
He met his wife on Myspace 10 years ago. They went to school together, and grew up together. They have three children – ages 9, 3, and 2 years old. On Friday, the couple finally made it official.
“I’ve seen her happy before, but I’ve never seen her as happy as that day,” Dhondup said.
Her sister, Rachel Vigil, said Jelly was famous for taking pictures of everything, even at her own wedding.
“The night of, as things were coming to an end, and people started to leave, she was running out the door to catch everybody, to take a picture with them,” Vigil said.
As her guests left, Jelly got those pictures, gave everyone a hug, and said goodbye, not knowing what that goodbye truly meant.
“I remember that night, I was just hoping that it was just a prank. Like she was just pranking us or something,” Dhondup said.
After the reception, Jelly was driving her niece, Mari, to get ready for a grand entrance at the after party.
“She was just talking about her family, and how much she loved them – talking about her husband, her kids literally she was talking about everyone,” Mari said.
She said the last thing they talked about was the song that was playing. Jelly said it reminded her of her niece.
“There was a moment where I was just looking at her, and paying attention to what she was saying, and I had looked up, and I had seen headlights,” Mari said.
After the crash, Jelly was able to get one phone call out, to one of her sisters. She gave them their location and asked for help.
“She talked to my sister for two minutes, and within that two minutes she had passed on,” said Vigil.
Family have had to look through photos of the crash. Vigil said it looked like Jelly swerved before impact, taking the brunt of the crash on her side of the car.
“If she didn’t swerve, we could have lost our niece – so she wasn’t just a bride, she was also a hero that night,” Vigil said.
Mari was not seriously injured in the crash, but said she was still hurting.
“Physically, I’m just sore. Mentally, I mean, mentally I don’t think any of us are ok. I think that night just traumatized me,” she said.
The family said they can’t quite comprehend how they could go from a wedding to a vigil in a matter of hours. Tenzing said he’s having a hard time talking to their children about it, though he thinks his oldest is starting to understand.
“I tried to comfort him, and he ended up going to sleep crying. I just don’t know what I’m going to say to them when they ask me, ‘Where’s my mom?’” he said.
Officials from the Utah Highway Patrol said the crash was one of five fatal collisions over the weekend, with six deaths – and six families all hurting like Jelly’s.
“Times this story by six. There are families that are struggling today because of what happened. Because of minute errors that people have made, and some pretty big ones, too,” said Major Jeff Nigbur, the assistant to the superintendent of Utah Highway Patrol.
“I’ve been doing this 21 years, and I haven’t seen that kind of frequency packed into such a short amount of time. It was a very intense weekend,” he said.
Nigbur said there was no simple answer as to why there were so many deadly crashes. Many were distracted drivers. Two were drunk drivers, ike the driver that killed Jelly.
Manaure Gonzalez-Rea, age 36, was arrested after the crash. He was being held in the Salt Lake County Jail. Nigbur said the suspect was driving the wrong way down I-15, crashing into Dhondup at freeway speeds.
After the crash, officials said he stole the car of a passerby that stopped to help, but was quickly caught by troopers.
“What type of human being does that?” asked Tenzing.
He wondered how anyone could be so heartless to run from the scene when people were obviously hurt.
“No time that they serve (in prison) will amount to the pain that we all are feeling right now,” he said.
Nigbur said the weekend’s crashes were intense for first responders. The officers that respond to these crashes were also struggling with what they witnessed at the scene.
They have mental health help for officers, but what they really need is help from the public. He asked Utahns to not drink and drive, don’t drive distracted or aggressive, and to always wear their seatbelt.
Officials said the state was ending a period known as the “100 Deadliest Days of Summer,” when crashes on Utah roads have historically increased. They said this was not the way to end it.
