Roy Mitchell's Reviews > The Devil Behind the Badge: The Horrifying Twelve Days of the Border Patrol Serial Killer

This book was too much for me. It's a horror and a tragedy, and Rick Jervis just I'm sorry but Rick you are probably not the author to write this. It's certainly a thing that happened and should be out there in some way, but the writing, it is not polished or absorbing. It has this metronome quality to it, obviously trying to rack up a page count on this one. Rick is a journalist and I have to say, I do not think there's enough of a story here to warrant a book. It's a ton of background information, a lot of speculation unless Juan Ortiz has admitted to saying some very specific things, but it could probably just be a long newspaper article. Maybe a multi part piece or a podcast. It's just misery on a grand scale for way too long. Cut out the gratuitous horror and you've got about 50 pages maximum. There is a lot of biographical information and it's all painful and I just wasn't sure what the point of reading or especially writing any of it was. It feels like Rick was going for Truman Capote but this is just not that, at all. Not by a long shot. I don't think the author was able to interview the killer so we aren't getting any kind of insight into what made him operate. There is conjecture and it boils down to shitty beer and PTSD.

The murderer here isn't saying or doing anything that necessitates a book. It seems like from the beginning the authorities were after him pretty dilligently, there's no conspiracy or a societal failure that needs looking into. It's just tragedy. I hope the proceeds here are going to some kind of outreach program to help people get clean. This story just isn't worth the steady onslaught of despair that you are going to endure. The guy kills a bunch of addicts who are sex workers, and is caught. The end.