This story is part of The Dallas Morning News Homicide Project was focused on sharing the stories of all the people murdered in Dallas in 2024..
A man of God, Pastor Rick Jordan has made it his life's work to bring justice and healing to those around him. As a teenager, he was at the forefront of the civil rights movement in Alabama. For the next half century, he helped bring peace to a moment of intense conflict in Dallas. Even in his retirement, he continues to be a prayer warrior for the congregation of Concord Church.
In late January, his eldest son, Steven Arnel Jordan, 53, was killed in gun violence in the city where he contributed so much.
Many times Stephen would take a walk late at night to the convenience store on Westmoreland Road. The store is west of Kiesto Park in Oak Cliff, around the corner from his house and not far from where he grew up.
This is the store that Stephen and his best friend from middle school stopped by after school. Where I took his brother to buy Gatorade after a basketball game. Where he bought snacks for the teens he coached while working for the Dallas Mavericks.
Police say this is where Stephen was shot and killed on the night of January 27th when he went outside after exchanging words with another man inside the store. No arrests have been made and police are unable to say anything further as there is currently an active investigation.
“Someone shot my son for nothing,” Pastor Jordan said. “I put a lot into Stephen.”
The story of the Jordan family is dallas morning newsThis year, we have made a commitment to profile every murder victim in our city. The death toll has continued to rise for weeks, outpacing our efforts to commemorate the lives lost.
While mass shootings garner sudden attention, every murder is heartbreaking. Those victims also deserve our respect. More than 200 people die each year in Dallas due to violence, including deaths caused by everyday altercations that have become deadly in this era of mass shootings.
Sitting at the kitchen table in Oak Cliff's Wynnewood Hills, Pastor Jordan and his younger son, H. Rick, spoke of their memories of Stephen and the deep shock that still grips their family.
“It's a thousand times more ironic that Stephen died in a shooting,” H. Rick, a professor at Dallas Baptist University's College of Business, told me.
H. Rick, 39, never saw Stephen get into a confrontation or use a gun.
“We've been all over the place in all the years,” he said. “That's not his temperament. He's a 'let's laugh, let's play' guy.”
Pastor Jordan nodded repeatedly. “I was really surprised when I heard the news.”
Their oldest son, Jordan, grew up in Alabama, marching with Martin Luther King Jr. as a teenager, and moved here in 1968 to attend Bishop College. An affair with a young woman from Dallas led to the birth of a child, Steven Arnell.
“We never got married, but my mom always said to me, 'You'll always take care of the baby,' and I did,” Pastor Jordan said. “He was in my life all his life.”
Stephen attended Kimball High School where he is remembered as an excellent student who excelled at soccer. He graduated with a degree in business administration from A&M University in Prairie, his view and at the same time was recognized by his professors and colleagues that he was a born salesman.
“He could sell anything,” H. Rick laughed. “Sales matched his personality. Funnily enough, it changed the atmosphere of the party.”
Their memories matched many of the online tributes I read. “When he walked into the room, everyone turned around and said, 'Who is this guy?'” Pastor Jordan said. we want to know him. ”
Stephen has held various sales positions, including in the insurance and restaurant industries. His favorite part was working in ticket sales for the Dallas Mavericks for many years. He eventually quit that job and after graduating from Morehouse College, he lived in Atlanta with H. Rick, who worked in the banking industry.
“My brother's ultimate success was his independence,” H. Rick said. “He was keen to 'stand on my own two feet'. I want to be my own man.”
No one knew Stephen better than Reginald Peel. H. Rick, who is 14 years younger than Stephen, said he doesn't remember ever meeting Peele because “he's been there forever, my brother's best friend.”
“They literally walked side by side and lived their lives together.”
Peel, as we all know, told me about the “Breakfast of Champions” event Stephen organized when he worked with the Mavericks. A talented motivational speaker, Stephen gathered local high school students and taught them public speaking.
“He loved so hard,” Peele said. “He loved life.”
After graduating from Bishop's University, Pastor Jordan eventually joined what was then Concord Missionary Baptist Church, founded by the venerable E. K. Bailey and his wife, Sheila. Eventually, Pastor Jordan began dating Sheila's sister Sandra, and they married in 1982, when Stephen was about 12 years old.
During Pastor Jordan's many years of service in Concord, first with Pastor Bailey and after his death with Pastor Brian Carter, Stephen's father assumed many responsibilities. That included serving as a prayer minister, then overseeing the church's senior citizen program, and then prison and substance abuse ministries.
Everyone I spoke to about Stephen said he inherited from his father a “preacher's soul” and a deep dedication to helping others, as well as his father's ability to inject an extraordinary sense of humor into any situation.
Peel laughed as she and Stephen, both Concord members, attended several other churches and criticized their pastors. “Rev. Bailey was his uncle, so we thought he had a lot of insight into what a preacher should be.”
Still close in their 50s, Peele and Stephen often talked about death, but always about the deaths of others.
“We're still going to be playing basketball when we're 75 years old,” Peel recalled telling each other. “We always thought of ourselves as those two old guys still competing with each other. Just laughing and joking.”
“That was my partner, that was my friend, that was my brother,” Peel said, then fell into a long silence.
Although Stephen never married or had children, he was loved by many. His funeral in Concord was attended by more than 1,000 people, including about 300 of his friends from his days at Prairie View A&M.
(Shafqat Anowar/Staff Photographer)
When I asked Pastor Jordan what his favorite memory was of Stephen, he patted H. Rick on the arm and said, “He loved his brother, he loved to have fun, and he loved cowboys.'' Ta.
Then Pastor Jordan added, his eyes clouded with tears and his cheerful voice quiet. “He was always trying to please people, he was always trying to please people.”
While Pastor Jordan takes comfort in knowing that Stephen died with Jesus in his heart, Pastor H. Rick said the grief is more complicated. H. Rick's first Mavs game, his first driving test, and his relationship with his first girlfriend's brother have become somewhat estranged in recent years.
They had cordial conversations on the phone, but they weren't as close as they used to be. Her girlfriend, H. Rick, who is now married with three children, told me that she disagrees with his brother on several issues. When asked about them, he simply said: I wish I had a better brother. ”
“Now my children don't know the version of my brother that I wanted them to know.”
When H. Rick's mother, Sandra, informed him of Stephen's death in the early morning hours of Sunday, January 28, he and his wife rushed to his parents' home. They sat in the living room for a long time. It is lined with old walls lined with framed photographs of generations of men on both sides of the Jordan family. The bottom row has a photo of Stephen and his H. Rick, just below the photo of his father.
In the nearly three months since his brother's murder, H. Rick has had little contact with the justice system, particularly with the two days it took to identify and release Stephen's body from the morgue and with Dallas police. I have felt a lot of dissatisfaction with this.
Speaking on behalf of the Jordan family, H. Rick said: We strive to do all we can to be who God has called us to be. ”
What about him? “Everything I've done is not a statistic, and now that I'm in my 30s, burying my brother from gun violence feels like a statistic.”
“The ground is tough,” H. Rick said. “But we put our trust in God.”
