“In an instant of extreme spontaneity, he heard a huge explosion whose impact increased in the distance. His immediate response was to pick up that communicator and pay attention to the description of the news”.
by Cristian Gasca and Óscar Durán.
In the western periphery of the department of Cundinamarca, where its Caldas counterpart establishes territorial limits, stands La Dorada, an iconic municipality whose founding lineage dates back to the end of the Thousand Days War. Twenty-six years ago, Jean Carlo Duque was born there. His childhood was spent in the nearby village of Guarinocito, in the company of his maternal grandparents, who raised him and provided him with shelter in those early stages of his life. His parents separated when he was barely five years old. After a while, his mother, Jenny, met someone else, another person with whom she would begin a new stage. That man would end up forging a meaningful relationship with the little boy. He became his stepfather. He had served as a policeman, and Jean would take the same course in the future. Early influence.
In spite of such difficulties, his grandparents managed to provide for the ward’s permanent sustenance and, in the same way, they educated him with commitment.
His grandmother taught him early on the moral values that to this day characterize his personality, teachings based on the traditional prototype of a helpful man. He was willing to be attentive to others and to persevere. On the other hand, his grandfather was to inculcate in him what for him represented the valuable esteem of work. He would take him with him, as a collaborator, to carry out the hard work of gardening that he did in the village. He had known the brio since childhood. Jean grew up by the hand of his ancestors and also by their example.
As he entered adolescence, he began to live with his mother. He describes her as a strict woman with whom, for several cycles, he had a complex and consistent relationship. Jean was born when Jenny was fifteen years old, which is why her grandparents subsequently assumed the necessary childcare. Now, at that time, Jean’s stepfather was assigned to work in the Mobile Squadrons of the Carabinieri (EMCAR). The division operates under the express mandate of ensuring the nation’s rural security. Naturally, it has a greater presence in rustic rural areas than in major urban concentrations. This situation prompted Jean’s mother to return to La Dorada. She resided, this time, with her son.
The new period in Jean’s life also brought a happy fate: he shared a great deal with his biological father, with whom he never lost contact. At the same time, he replicated the same with his mother’s new partner. He was someone who, despite not treasuring a blood tie in Jean, always showed himself willing to establish the best of bonds with her person. She frequented him at family events and took an active part in vouching for his livelihood. Jean’s is remembered by himself as a happy youth. One that still continues.
The peak of her joy was the birth of a baby brother. The son of his stepfather and his mother. Jean had longed most fervently to have such a companion. When he arrived, he exercised his role as big brother in the noblest and purest way that someone of his premature longevity could. She would prepare his snack, change his clothes and, eventually, take him with her to various sports practices. As he was instructed: predilection and service. That became Jean’s daily routine until he finished high school in 2014. In full conviction to continue his stepfather’s legacy, he then decided to enlist in the National Police almost three years later, after reaching the age of majority.
Manizales was the site of the beginning of his preparation. The hundred kilometers that now separated him from his native home were for Jean a reason for a drastic shock that afflicted him for some time. “I had never been far from home. Not that far. The change was quite noticeable, but I was saying it wasn’t impossible to go on. I thought that, if that was the goal, one had to sacrifice, show courage and do it with all the attitude,” he recalls. The burden of the situation might seem excessive in the judgment of someone who recalls similar experiences with a mature zephyr. This was no such case. Jean was no more than nineteen years old. When he left for the City of Open Doors, the date coincided in unlikely but true luck with his little brother’s eighth birthday. He was unable to attend, and grief was inevitable. Although the fortune of that coincidence seemed to be due to mania, he was comforted to find himself fulfilling the laborious desire preceded by his stepfather.
At the end of the year that elapsed until the end of that first course, Jean had stood out among the large group of young people who were trained with him. He was chosen as one of the twenty most outstanding. The selection of patrolmen awaited with eagerness and intrigue the scoop of the division to which they would be assigned to move there and start operating. All after receiving the relevant confirmation. Jean’s destination was the Antinarcotics Directorate, where he would be in charge of supporting the eradication of illegal crops. He was to report to the National Police Training School (CENOP) to receive the corresponding training. His squad was received and trained by the Comandos Jungla, an elite special operations group of the National Police.
Active since 1989, the Jungles, as they are popularly known, are internationally recognized as one of the most lethal police units on the planet. Their continuous and fierce fight against the backdrop of drug trafficking, criminal gangs and organized crime merits it. In their heyday, they received world-class training from the Special Air Service (SAS), an army corps of the British forces. It was then that the Commandos became the benchmark division for the successful counter-narcotics operations for which they are now renowned. The new members of CENOP would be made to experience, in spades, the reason for their unblemished reputation. A tailor-made set-up.
“ I remember that they took everything out of us. It was physically and psychologically demanding, very hard,” Jean says. One of the last challenges of that infernal training, the traditionally nicknamed “queen test”, is not far from his memory
A march of eighteen kilometers was imposed on the trainees, who had to carry a backpack full of sand, weighing twenty kilos. The bodily demand that such a journey implied would be of great help in certifying the suitability of the physiological conditions of the men who managed to complete it. Jean was one of those flamboyant winners. Once he removed the thick boots that protected his feet, he noticed the blood emanating from his soles. It was the product of an unequaled effort. The exhilaration of satisfaction obtained after such a feat is worthy of longing.
The formative completion of the martyrdom cycle gave rise to the possibility for Jean to apply to become a canine guide at the Directorate. Due to the precise results of the medical tests, it was not possible for him to do so. The indicators of his blood properties showed a certain degree of allergy to dogs. Consequently, he opted for the recommended alternative of training as a metal detectorist, a position of inherent importance in the processes of identification and eradication of illicit crops.
His adaptation was as brief as it was precise, the underlying knowledge from his previously completed process then became highly relevant. After little more than a month, he was ready. The most arduous stage seemed to have been overcome. Jean’s first duty station in his new position was one of collective familiarity within the ranks of the Antinarcotics Directorate, the vestige of all sorts of unalterable memories resting there: San Andres de Tumaco. It is true that nothing has escaped being narrated when it comes to the port municipality. The pseudonym of the Pearl of the Pacific is insightful.
Jean successfully completed several months of missions. He was not unaware of the sacrifices they entailed. He also used the experience provided by his training courses to gain confidence and serenity. Strengths applicable to future experiences. The first operations were accentuated by constant outbursts of anxiety, which caused him great shocks. The never-ending fear of being exposed to one or several anti-personnel mines while he was incessantly struggling with the fiery attempt to pinpoint their precise location. It was his job: to warn of the presence of those sinister devices that surround irregular plantations. Demand and attrition. He had been there since 2019. He managed to advance, without major setbacks, the totality of four phases of eradication, each one close to eighty days of permanence.
It is hard to say that this is not an easy job. The operations patrol is made up of several police officers with their specialties: canine guides, explosives experts, nurses and, of course, detectorists; like Jean. His duties included covering wide routes that were likely to be inspected with the detection instrument, which he usually carried on his back. In support of his companions, he was in charge of examining such stretches. He would travel over areas of sufficiently flat terrain for the machine to operate fully, while the guides would do the same in areas of higher undergrowth, always in procession of their canine.
Before starting each task, it was necessary to perform a highly effective test to certify the optimal conditions of the detector device. It consisted of using a silicon rod between fifteen and twenty centimeters long with a piece of metal tied to its tip. When the piece was brought close to the machine, the latter had to emit the relevant warning signal. The exercise might seem banal. However, its success ensured that the instrument’s capacity exceeded a minimum depth that could be inspected in order to detect the presence of an anti-personnel mine. The authorities often point out that it is not the explosive device itself, but the metallic material of which it is composed, that is essentially what can be located. Jean was risking his life in such a risky task, a reason of indubitable sufficiency to adopt the rigidity of any valuable precaution. The effectiveness of such reserves is considerable; unfortunately, not absolute.
For a formidable but still young policeman, it was a great help to meet the person with whom he would form one of the greatest fraternities of his life: Nares Mora. As he adjusted to the daily routine of the eradication phases, Jean was warmly welcomed by a colleague whose seniority in the division gave him the experience and prestige necessary to generate firm trust among his peers. An exceptional quality for those who work for others rather than for themselves. A similar gesture was made by Nares to the then still-improving agent. He was ready to assist him with any doubts that his relentless work might generate and also invited him to visit his base on more than one occasion.
It is not by chance that Jean has been approached by various personalities along his path, with a continuous and energetic positive propensity. The gentle temperament that characterizes him is easily distinguished. Such aptitude has to be enhanced with the unwavering character that gives him the right conditions to conceive an identity erected between the greatest virtues that contrast the extremes of naivety and arrogance. That is how he is, and many recognized it immediately. Nares’ was a case that, unfortunately, would precede an almost shared fate. “In the operations area you don’t make friends. You make brothers. Because we all go through the same thing,” Jean reflects.
Missionary squads of the same faction are known as cassettes. The uniformed men are divided into groups of this denomination to operate in specific zones. In one of the nascent phases of eradication, which was barely twenty days old, Jean and Nares were assigned to different cassettes: the sixth and tenth, respectively; so that, in spite of being in the same sector, the geography of the sector separated them by notable distances. Close but far away.
Jean was in the daily review of a crop along with the other units in his cassette. He had his radio, equipped as a means of contact with the other branches of the squadron. In an instant of extreme spontaneity, he heard a huge explosion whose impact increased in the distance. His immediate response was to pick up the communicator and pay attention to the description of the news, which was reported through the device. He learned about what had happened: an accident that had happened to his colleagues in the neighboring location. They mentioned the names. Nares was among them.
His friend had lost both legs. “I was in shock. I said I couldn’t go on, I didn’t have the ability to do it. I started to feel really bad,” Jean recalls. That same night, back at the patrol base, the uniformed men held a joint prayer, fortified in their beliefs, to pray for the health of their fallen comrade. It was around eleven o’clock at night when, through a new radio broadcast, Jean learned of the death. Everything had happened in an unforeseeable lapse of time that did not admit of any foresight.
His was an almost imposed tenacity to carry on. Jean’s attention remained fixed on the death of Nares, whose heart did not resist the afflictions of the incident. The onslaught of the detonation did not reveal such consequences with immediacy, it was the reason why the ultimate fatality was unleashed in nocturnal instances. All the commandos lived with the constant uneasiness of being exposed to similar fates to those of their fallen comrades.
Jean was not completely unfamiliar with the terrible sensation of that experience. Another of his greatest friends, with whom he shared the path of the Anti-Narcotics Directorate, had also suffered a similar calamity in February of that remote 2019. It was the novelty of Néider Parra. The innate destiny of this one did not bring about his demise. Néider managed to survive. In no way, Jean seemed to be approaching misfortunes that, as the fruit of a malignant aim, awaited for him experiences that challenged his capacity to overcome. The great thing about it is that he would.
It was March 31 of the same year, which did not stop rising abominably. In the early hours of the morning, Jean’s cassette, composed of four other men, undertook the mission that by then was becoming a priority: they had traced the route to follow to find the location of two coca processing laboratories. They had advanced all the planning the day before. The stretch lasted about an hour and a half. At the first of the two targets, Jean set about calibrating his detector with the usual check, using the silicon bar. He examined the installation and ruled out any imminent danger. The troop then executed the dismantling by burning.
It was on the way to the second laboratory that everything happened. The uniformed men, in brotherhood, advanced. The formation was led by the scout guide Navarro, followed by Jean, the captain in charge and, behind him, the explosives expert Cardona and the nurse Calvache. It is common among police units to expressly refer to the last name of their colleagues, sometimes before their first names. Their identity within the institution is thus established. As a protocol measure, the lineup maintained a preventive distance of five meters between each of its members. The purpose was to avoid the consequent disqualification of the whole group should anything new occur. The positional separation between the men had to be sufficient so that, in the worst case scenario, they would not all be affected.
This strategy of staying away had the misfortune of being put to the test on that fateful second run. The Navarro guide was leading the way. He was about to cross a large log lying in the path. Having overcome the obstacle, Jean was ready to replicate the action. He remembers to take a step during the process and, suddenly, to rise quickly to a height that had to be positioned around three meters above the ground. Measurement resulting from his agitated perception of trajectory. The sensation he experienced when falling kept him stunned. “At that moment, I was not aware of anything. It was like watching a movie and pausing it. Because it was like that. My world came to a standstill,” he recapitulates.
The afterimages in Jean’s mind were eloquent. He visualized, in what he remembers seeing as the sequential order of a spinning roulette wheel, his life. “I saw myself as a child, as a teenager, and then as I was now. I saw my mom, my dad, my grandparents… Everyone. It was the summary of my story. The reflection that moved him the most at the time was that of his mother. Three days before the event, Jean managed to get a phone signal to communicate with her. It was a feat. The area of operations in Tumaqueña did not usually have stable, much less permanent, coverage. For the families of the policemen present there, the traditional method of contact used to be the only available alternative to know that their loved ones were safe. One of sporadic recurrence. Relief is thus increased when the news is as expected.
The entire call had been filled with Jenny’s incessant claims of concern for her son. She claimed she had a bad feeling concerning the exposure he was in. At the glimpses of his work. She confessed to him that the most tragic thoughts afflicted her, making her imagine undesirable fates that, only until she established contact with Jean’s base, could she rule out. When assimilating the vicissitude that such confirmations of security are given after the course of inexhaustible waits, the ordeal they entail is more accurately dimensioned. Only to repeat the cycle once again. It is a Sisyphean journey accomplished.
All the men joined forces to help Jean after the detonation. They removed the remnants of the uniform that were encasing his wounds, held him still and injected him with a special substance to stimulate his adrenaline levels. The visual impact of the scene was just beginning to settle in. “The first thing I did was lift my right foot, which was the affected one. When I lifted it up, it broke open in about three pieces. The toe was where the heel goes. The ankle was over there… I didn’t even know how,” says Jean.
It was Calvache who promptly set about bandaging him and, together with the others, placed the optimal tourniquet on his body for the hemorrhage he was suffering. The pain was unheard of. It was magnified by the fact that he had to make his own way and that of his faithful comrades to the landing location of the rescue helicopter. The vehicle arrived at the closest admissible coordinates to the area; however, it was impossible for him to land at the exact spot where the cassette was located. This situation slightly delayed the extraction. With Jean’s condition. Visceral in every way.
Its novelty was one of the numerous contingencies that had taken place in that wretched camp. It had happened to Néider a month earlier, precisely one kilometer from the site. Jean was also a victim of the unwanted civilian quarrels that surrounded the place where the policeman had to continue his transfer on board a land ambulance. It so happens that certain sectors of the rural population perceive the authorities’ anti-narcotics efforts as infamous efforts to decimate the territory’s sources of income, which, although they emanate as archaic sustenance from local insurgent groups, also often end up generating revenue among ordinary people. War is not fiction. An unmistakable division between two sides, good and bad, is everything before it is realistic. It is not that simple.
First aid, which included stabilization by means of anesthesia, relieved Jean’s physical condition to a fair extent. He then arranged to be flown to the city of Bogota. The flight in question took just under three hours, an eternity in which resistance to pain was seen as a mythical quality impossible to maintain. The reactions of the rescuers who saw Jean made him wonder himself about the seriousness of his condition, of which he was not yet fully aware.
Jenny imagined the worst when she was informed of the facts. She rushed to ask if her son had died from the explosion. Fortunately, Jean was able to talk to her while he was in the hospital, giving her the reassurance that he was alive. She also asked him to come to the hospital and assured him that they would talk again after the priority surgery he was about to undergo. It was an urgent operation planned to safeguard the integrity of the foot. Despite medical efforts, it was not possible to achieve this. The orthopedist in charge informed Jean that, together with the board of professionals attending him, they had noticed that there was no way to recover the integrity of his limb. He would lose it.
Jean’s parents were already at the clinic. After the onslaught of irreparable moments of emotional shock that afflicted his beloved mother in particular, she agreed to sign the pertinent authorization for the amputation that was required. She could not believe that her child, just twenty-one years old at the time, would be involved in the mandatory death of a part of his body. The understandable refusal to sign that initially invaded her was repelled by a compelling motive. More than persuasive. If she waited any longer, it was likely that the amputation would no longer need to be performed on Jean’s foot. It would be on a higher part of his leg, near the knee, and would cover the whole of the resulting region. It was then that the woman gave in.
Jean regained full consciousness about a week after the operation. He was intubated in an intensive care unit. He recalled experiencing moments of irreverent anguish during the operating procedures. He had temporarily lost somatic mobility while, internally, he remained unaltered in a wakeful phase. This is how he experienced it. A comatose state. His auditory sense remained intact, noticing the sounds around him in various stages in which his organism maintained all the anatomical actions of a concerning rest.
Once he was in a stable condition and with limited freedom of movement, Jean began to examine on his own the traces that had manifested themselves in his body. He knew that the shock wave of the detonation had reached one of his kidneys and, at the same time, had also generated problems in one of his lungs. He then set out to see the damage that could be seen with the naked eye; among them, of course, his foot. When he uncovered the blanket that covered it, the area revealed a scene that produced in Jean a sudden shiver. Immediately. He noticed the scar of the cut made. It was a crossroads of his natural composition with the counterpart derived from the medical intervention. In temporary replacement of the now amputated foot, lay a supporting heel.
Contrary to all prognosis, Jean remembers to push with vigorous enthusiasm a fulminating thought into his being. Instantly and with an aura of ultimatum. “I have two options: I can either lie down and die, crying and knowing that my foot is not coming back, or I can simply adapt to the change that this implies and take advantage of the doors that will open up for me as a result. I choose the second option,” he said to himself at the time. And he went back to shelter.
The most emotional part of such a sumptuous stage is stored in his memoirs. Because of the temporary dumbness with which he remained, he had to write a note to his mother to communicate with her. Even with her in front of him. Since the buccal surface of his jaw was extensively affected, it was temporarily impossible for him to speak. The message to Jenny included an overt thank you for her unconditional companionship, also asking her if she would love him in the same way even under the detriment of his sequelae. “My king, I will love you any way I can,” she replied as she kissed his forehead. To this day, she keeps the writing.
In complete accordance with the impulse to overcome that pervaded Jean’s awakening mandate, he began his healing process as soon as possible. Once he was habilitated in the optimal area, he began to attend recovery therapies. He did so together with Néider. Both were discharged from intensive care very close to each other. They were only days apart, despite the considerable time lag between the two accidents.
“We spent about a year in therapy. It was a very difficult treatment because, as the nurses told us, it depended on our own effort to walk again,” Jean says. It is inevitable for him to joyfully emphasize the undeniable importance of Néider’s entourage in keeping him unbeatable in his crusade to move forward. Their company had equal value in his friend’s process. There was mutuality. Jean received the required prosthesis nine months later. He quickly became accustomed to its use, as he still had the functionality of his knee. Walking became easier.
Due to a setback resulting from the amputation, the tibia of his leg was unprotected. As the days went by, the bone remained exposed as it served as an irregular support, which is why Jean needed to be operated on again. There was an imminent risk of cracking. Five more centimeters of the bony body were cut out. Unable to obtain general anesthesia, Jean was forced to witness the scene. He describes the experience as traumatic. Only his legs were lethargic and he was consciously aware of everything. It showed the strength resulting from that onslaught that took hold of him when he awoke in the intensive care unit. Some time later, such a will would remain.
The persevering predisposition with which Jean faced his fate would pay off sooner rather than later. He received an invitation from the U.S. Embassy to participate in the Bogotá Half Marathon while he was still on crutches. He completed about five kilometers. An enormous merit. Influenced by the unwavering attitude he showed during the competition, the consular organizers decided to offer him and his companions permanent support in the sports field.
Jean also began training as a professional psychologist. He is currently in his fourth year. It is a project he started almost simultaneously with Néider, who opted for the same educational path. They have shared destinies since 2019. One in support of the other. In parallel, Jean has been tirelessly dedicated to continue improving his athletic form. Already in more fit conditions favored by his prosthesis, he participated in various competitions held in Washington, Orlando and Miami. Reminiscent of the Jungle training. Now he is preparing for the New York Marathon. Nothing has stopped him. He intends to exceed forty kilometers.
His story is one to which he took it upon himself to instruct meaning. “I don’t regret everything that happened. Today I am very well”, Jean assures after recalling that, at the time, he reproached God about the why and what for of what happened. These are questions that he solved on his own. He has only been motivated by the fact that he retains his independence, the integrity of his ability to act by his own design both in the physical and mental spectrum. Such grace, coupled with the valuable companionship and support of his loved ones, makes him a fortunate man.
One who does not exceed thirty years of age, and yet represents the legacy of colleagues whose death he has known, such as that of Nares. His contribution is as real as it is symbolic. It captures the experience of someone who has lived profuse decades. He reiterates: he has no regrets.
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