Breaking Midnight, Lynn Walker, author
This true story, related by the daughter of a man who lost his way from the straight and narrow to the crooked and wide, is as authentic as any crime story can be. The narrative is almost like a personal conversation with the accused, as he confesses to her. It is easy to read and puts the reader right there with John Walker as he travels from one point in his life to another. Seemingly, he is always trying to improve his attitude and behavior, but most often he is failing because crime has become his drug of choice. He loves the excitement of what to him is a “game”. He never once thinks realistically about the victims he leaves in his wake because of his criminal activity. What he does best is making up excuses for his behavior, justifying acts that cannot be justified.
From the very first, it is difficult to admire or even like John Walker. It is even hard to sympathize with his problems because they are man-made and selfish. In addition, he shows no remorse for his behavior or his failures as a husband, father or son. As a former cop, he is a terrible example. He highlights the example of a dirty cop, of police brutality and of the crooked justice system. He seems to enjoy beating the system more than working within it.
He loves the drug world that he learned to navigate as a narcotics investigator. Did he forget how to move between both worlds? Finally, brainwashed, did he settle into the wrong one? Was he suffering from the Stockholm Syndrome? What could make the son of a clergyman, who was a marine, a seminary student, and a policeman, go so completely wrong? As time passes, he sinks lower and lower into the abyss, using drugs with his kids, dealing with them, and ultimately, dealing with Pablo Escobar.
Did the Cocaine make him lose sight of the reality of what he was doing, the harm he was causing to those he professed to love? Did he simply have absolutely no moral compass? Was he a sociopath? Walker was proud of the fact that he was a successful drug dealer. He was proud of the fact that the notorious Pablo Escobar, trusted him. He was proud of the fact that Columbian drug lords welcomed him into their families. He was proud of the fact that he was always honest with the drug cartel! What kind of a man is proud of being honest, in a world of dishonesty and violence, instead of being proud of simply being honest, of doing hard work that brings pride to himself and his family as a reward? Walker was only proud of the money he earned. He really defined the idea of only a thin line separating a cop from a criminal.
In addition, why were so many women so desperate, that regardless of this man’s background, they wanted to marry him? He was married three times. He had umpteen girlfriends. Yet he was what can only be defined as a low life. In reality he was also a drunk, an addict, a smuggler and a dealer. He was best at living a double life. In one, he was loving and kind. In the other, he had no moral compass. He corrupted his kids and seemed to have no remorse about anything he did. He simply made- up excuses for his depraved behavior.
This man and the people who seemed to gravitate toward him confounded me. What could set up such a tragic set of circumstances for a young man who actually started out with all the right values? His father was a Reverend. His mother was a woman of faith. Did his friends and a foolish high school incident set the stage for the rest of his life? What set him on the wrong track? That question stayed with me. Why was John Walker trapped between the world of honor and the world of dishonor? Why was he far more comfortable in the world he was supposed to be playacting in, as an undercover narcotics agent, than the world of a hardworking police officer and upstanding citizen?
Perhaps, since it takes a certain kind of person to be able to live a double life, in the end, that person has to choose one life or the other. One would hope it would be the honest life. However, for Walker it was not. This book shows how easily one can slip from one identity to another. Walker became so entrenched in the life of his alter ego that he lost sight of who he was when he started out as an officer of the law. He was good at being a narcotics agent, he was good at selling himself and his product; the system trained him well to be both a cop and a criminal. Written by the daughter he had with his first wife, the story is authentic, as it represents the way he told it to her, the story of how he became a drug smuggler because he was a good undercover, narcotics agent.