John Clay Walker (October 5, 1948 – January 30, 1985) was an American journalist and aspiring novelist who was abducted, tortured and murdered in Mexico by members of the Guadalajara Cartel under orders of their leader Rafael Caro Quintero.
Caro Quintero suspected Walker of working as an undercover U.S. Drug Enforcement Agent (DEA) while he lived in Guadalajara, Jalisco.
Throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s, Walker worked as a reporter and photographer at small papers in Minnesota and Iowa.
On January 30, 1985, John Walker and his friend Albert Radelat were planning on going to dinner at a Guadalajara restaurant when they accidentally walked into one of Rafael Caro Quintero's private parties.
Radelat was still alive when the men were wrapped in table cloths and taken to the San Isidro Mazatepec Park in Zapopan and buried.