Editing Jonestown (section)

==Events in Jonestown before the arrival of Leo Ryan==
===White Night and the Six Day Siege===
Jones' [[paranoia]] and [[drug abuse]] increased in Jonestown as he became fearful of a government raid on the commune, citing concerns that the community would not be able to resist an attack.{{sfn|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=390}} He made frequent addresses to Temple members regarding Jonestown's safety, including statements that U.S. intelligence agencies were conspiring with "capitalist pigs" to destroy the settlement and harm its inhabitants.<ref name="q322"/><ref>Jim Jones, [http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27387 Transcript of Recovered FBI tape Q 234] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170516171446/http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27387|date=May 16, 2017}}. ''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University.</ref><ref>Jim Jones, [http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27299 Transcript of Recovered FBI tape Q 051] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170516161638/http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27299|date=May 16, 2017}}. ''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University.</ref>

Jones was known to regularly study Adolf Hitler and [[Father Divine]] to learn how to manipulate members of the cult. Divine told Jones personally to "find an enemy" and "to make sure they know who the enemy is" as it would unify those in the group and make them subservient to him.<ref>Archived at [https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/LvJtjSD0J2g Ghostarchive]{{cbignore}} and the [https://web.archive.org/web/20200217035547/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvJtjSD0J2g&gl=US&hl=en Wayback Machine]{{cbignore}}: {{Cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvJtjSD0J2g|title=Jonestown Survivor Laura Johnston Kohl – AllOutAttack Podcast w/ Harry Robinson – #2|last=Robinson|first=Harry|date=14 February 2019|website=YouTube}}{{cbignore}}</ref>

After work, when purported emergencies arose, the Temple sometimes conducted what Jones referred to as "White Nights."<ref>{{Harvnb|Layton|1998|p=178}}</ref> During such events, Jones would call, "Alert, Alert, Alert" over Jonestown's tower speakers to call the community together in the pavilion, which was then surrounded by guards armed with guns and [[crossbow]]s.{{sfn|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=390}} On several occasions, Jones then gave his followers four options: attempt to flee to the Soviet Union, commit "revolutionary suicide", stay in Jonestown and fight the purported attackers or flee into the jungle.<ref>Jones, Jim. The White Nights were originally called 'Omegas', denoting their finality, but when Jones decided that the events more properly marked a new beginning and an evolution to a higher form of socialist consciousness, they were briefly renamed 'Alphas'. This second title was only briefly used, and 'White Night' was adopted soon thereafter. Jones refers to an 'Omega' on one tape recorded at Jonestown, the only known time when this title was used. Confusingly, this mention came after the switch to 'White Night' had been made.
[http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27514 "Transcript of Recovered FBI tape Q 642."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150205011646/http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27514|date=5 February 2015}} ''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University.</ref>

On at least two occasions during White Nights, after a "revolutionary suicide" vote was reached, a simulated [[mass suicide]] was rehearsed. Temple defector Deborah Layton described the event in an [[affidavit]]:

<blockquote>Everyone, including the children, was told to line up. As we passed through the line, we were given a small glass of red liquid to drink. We were told that the liquid contained poison and that we would die within 45 minutes. We all did as we were told. When the time came when we should have dropped dead, Rev. Jones explained that the poison was not real and that we had just been through a loyalty test. He warned us that the time was not far off when it would become necessary for us to die by our own hands.<ref name="laytonaff"/></blockquote>

One drill lasted for six days. Known as the "Six Day Siege," this ordeal was used thereafter by Jones as a symbol of the community's indomitable spirit. For days on end, frightened settlers ringed the commune, armed with [[machete]]s and whatever crude tools would serve as weapons. Surrounding them, Jones claimed, were mercenaries bent on murder, as well as the abduction of Jones' son John Victor Stoen and others. Marceline and others outside of the commune engaged in interminable shortwave radio conversations with Jones, seeking to dissuade him from ordering a mass suicide. The panic reached such a point that an ''[[ad hoc]]'' evacuation was ordered by Jones, with dozens of settlers hastily loaded onto boats on the George River for a purported exodus to Cuba. Several people fell into the river, suffering injuries. At last, Jones bowed to pressure, and the drill ended. Veterans of the "Siege" were held in high regard in Jonestown, and in numerous addresses Jones tearfully recalled their stoic courage on the "front line."{{sfn|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=390}}

The Temple had received monthly half-pound shipments of [[cyanide]] since 1976 after Jones obtained a jeweler's license to buy the chemical, purportedly to clean gold.<ref>[http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/11/12/jonestown.cyanide/index.html "Jones plotted cyanide deaths years before Jonestown"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081204082147/http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/11/12/jonestown.cyanide/index.html|date=4 December 2008}} CNN, 12 November 2008</ref> In May 1978, a Temple doctor wrote a memo to Jones asking permission to test cyanide on Jonestown's pigs, as their [[metabolism]] was close to that of human beings.<ref>[http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=31349 Thirty Years Later] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150205014036/http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=31349|date=5 February 2015}}. Carter, Tim. Retrieved 1 August 2013.</ref>

===Stoen custody dispute===
{{Main|Timothy Stoen}}
In September 1977, former Temple members Tim and Grace Stoen battled in a Georgetown court to produce an order for the Temple to show cause why a final order should not be issued returning their five-year-old son, John.<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=361}}</ref> A few days later, a second order was issued for John to be taken into [[protective custody]] by authorities.<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=366}}</ref> The fear of being held in [[contempt of court|contempt]] of the orders caused Jones to set up a false [[sniper]] attack upon himself and begin the "Six Day Siege."<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|pp=360–372}}</ref>

Jonestown rallies began to take an almost surreal tone as black activists [[Angela Davis]] and [[Huey Newton]] communicated via radio-telephone to the settlers, urging them to hold strong against the "conspiracy."<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=369}}</ref> Jones made radio broadcasts stating "we will die unless we are granted freedom from harassment and [[right of asylum|asylum]]."<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=367}}</ref> Reid finally assured Marceline that the [[Guyana Defence Force]] would not invade Jonestown.<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=370}}</ref>

=== Exploring another potential exodus ===
Following the "Six Day Siege," despite Reid's assurances, Jones no longer believed the Guyanese could be trusted.<ref name="raven371">{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=371}}</ref> He directed Temple members to write to over a dozen foreign governments inquiring about immigration policies relevant to another exodus by the Temple.<ref name="raven371"/> He also wrote to the State Department, inquiring about North Korea and [[Socialist People's Republic of Albania|Albania]], then enduring the [[Sino-Albanian split]].<ref name="raven371"/> In Georgetown, the Temple conducted frequent meetings with the embassies of the Soviet Union, Cuba, North Korea and [[Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia|Yugoslavia]].<ref name="moore165"/> Negotiations with the Soviet embassy included extensive discussions of possible resettlement there. The Temple produced memoranda discussing potential places within the Soviet Union in which they might settle.<ref name="moore165">{{Harvnb|Moore|1985|p=165}}</ref>

Sharon Amos, Michael Prokes, Matthew Blunt, Timothy Regan<ref>{{citation|last=Ryans|first=Larry|title=Jonestown History}}</ref> and other Temple members took active roles in the "Guyana-Korea Friendship Society," which sponsored two seminars on the revolutionary concepts of Kim Il-sung.<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=416}}</ref> In April 1978, a high-ranking correspondent of the Soviet news agency [[TASS]] and his wife visited Jones.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Moore|first=Rebecca|date=2013|title=Rhetoric, Revolution and Resistance in Jonestown, Guyana|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.5840/jrv2013134|journal=Journal of Religion and Violence|volume=1|issue=3|pages=303–321|doi=10.5840/jrv2013134|issn=2159-6808|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Q759 Transcript – Alternative Considerations of Jonestown & Peoples Temple|url=https://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27581|access-date=2021-08-23|language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Edith Roller Journals: April 1978 – Alternative Considerations of Jonestown & Peoples Temple|url=https://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=35695|access-date=2021-10-23|language=en-US}}</ref> On 2 October 1978, Feodor Timofeyev, the Soviet [[Consul (representative)|consul]] in Georgetown, visited Jonestown for two days and gave a speech.<ref name="q352">Jones, Jim. [http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27428 "Transcript of Recovered FBI tape Q 352."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304094827/http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=27428|date=March 4, 2016}} ''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University.</ref> Jones stated before the speech, "For many years, we have let our sympathies be quite publicly known, that the United States government was not our mother, but that the Soviet Union was our spiritual motherland."<ref name="q352"/> Timofeyev opened the speech stating that the Soviet Union would like to send "our deepest and the most sincere greetings to the people of this first socialist and communist community of the United States of America, in Guyana and in the world".<ref name="q352"/> Both speeches were met by cheers and applause from the crowd in Jonestown.<ref name="q352"/>

Following the visit, Temple members met almost weekly with Timofeyev to discuss a potential Soviet exodus.<ref name="moore165"/> However, Jones eventually had a change of heart, stating that he preferred to stay within the Guyanese borders because of the [[sovereignty]] it afforded them.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Poster |first1=Alexander |title=Jonestown:An International Story of Diplomacy, Detente, And Neglect, 1973–1978|journal=Diplomatic History|date=2019|volume=43|issue=2|pages=305–331|doi=10.1093/dh/dhy072}}</ref>

===Concerned Relatives===
Meanwhile, in late 1977 and early 1978, the Stoens participated in meetings with other relatives of Jonestown residents at the home of [[Jeannie Mills]], another Temple defector. Together, they called themselves the "Concerned Relatives."<ref name="raven408">{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=408}}</ref> Tim Stoen engaged in letter-writing campaigns to the [[U.S. Secretary of State]] and the Guyanese government, and traveled to Washington, D.C. to lobby for an official investigation.<ref name="sims">Sims, Hank, [http://www.northcoastjournal.com/092503/cover0925.html ''Tim Stoen's Story''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080515144942/http://www.northcoastjournal.com/092503/cover0925.html|date=15 May 2008}}, North Coast Journal, September 25, 2003</ref> In January 1978, Stoen wrote a [[white paper]] to [[United States Congress|Congress]] detailing his grievances and requesting that [[Member of Congress#United States|congressmen]] write to Burnham; ninety-one congressmen, including [[Leo Ryan]], wrote such letters.<ref name="raven458">{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=458}}</ref><ref name="hall227">{{Harvnb|Hall|1987|p=227}}</ref>

On 17 February 1978, Jones submitted to an interview with ''[[The San Francisco Examiner|San Francisco Examiner]]'' reporter [[Tim Reiterman]].<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|pp=380–383}}</ref> Reiterman's subsequent story about the Stoen custody battle prompted the immediate threat of a lawsuit by the Temple.<ref name="raven383">{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=383}}</ref> The repercussions were devastating for the Temple's reputation, and made most former supporters more suspicious of the Temple's claims that it was the victim of a "[[political right|rightist]] vendetta."<ref name="raven383"/> Still, others remained loyal. On the day after Reiterman's article was published, [[Harvey Milk]] – a member of the [[San Francisco Board of Supervisors]] who was supported by the Temple – wrote a letter to [[President of the United States|President]] [[Jimmy Carter]] defending Jones "as a man of the highest character" and stating that Temple defectors were trying to "damage Rev. Jones' reputation" with "apparent bold-faced lies."<ref name="milk_let">Milk, Harvey [http://www.brasscheck.com/jonestown/milk.jpg ''Letter Addressed to President Jimmy Carter, Dated February 19, 1978''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110429202656/http://www.brasscheck.com/jonestown/milk.jpg|date=29 April 2011}}</ref>

On 11 April 1978, the Concerned Relatives distributed a packet of documents, including letters and affidavits, that they titled an "Accusation of Human Rights Violations by Rev. James Warren Jones" to the Peoples Temple, members of the press and members of Congress.<ref>[http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=13080 "Accusation of Human Rights Violations by Rev. James Warren Jones. April 11, 1978.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150205012738/http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=13080 |date=February 5, 2015}} ''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University.</ref> In June 1978, Layton provided the group with a further affidavit detailing alleged crimes by the Temple and substandard living conditions in Jonestown.<ref name="laytonaff">[http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=13072 "Affidavit of Deborah Layton Blakey."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150205013358/http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=13072|date=February 5, 2015}} ''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University.</ref>

Tim Stoen represented three members of the Concerned Relatives in lawsuits filed in May and June 1978 against Jones and other Temple members, seeking in excess of $56 million in [[damages]].<ref name="moore259">{{Harvnb|Moore|1985|p=259}}</ref> The Temple, represented by [[Charles Garry]], filed a suit against Stoen on 10 July 1978, seeking $150 million in damages.<ref name="moore268">{{Harvnb|Moore|1985|p=268}}</ref>

===Conspiracism===
During July and August of 1978, Jones sought the legal services of [[Mark Lane (author)|Mark Lane]] and [[Donald Freed]], both [[John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories|Kennedy assassination conspiracy theorists]], to help make the case of a "[[conspiracy theory|grand conspiracy]]" by U.S. intelligence agencies against the Temple.<ref name="reiterman440">{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=440}}</ref> Jones told Lane he wanted to "pull an [[Eldridge Cleaver]]" and return to the U.S. after repairing his reputation.<ref name="reiterman440"/> In September, Lane spoke to the residents of Jonestown, providing support for Jones' theories and comparing him to [[Martin Luther King Jr.]]<ref name="reiterman440"/> Lane then held press conferences stating that "none of the charges" against the Temple "are accurate or true" and that there was a "massive conspiracy" against the Temple by "intelligence organizations," naming the [[Central Intelligence Agency|CIA]], the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation|FBI]], and even the [[U.S. Postal Service]].<ref name="reiterman440"/> Though Lane presented himself as a disinterested party, Jones was actually paying him $6,000 per month to generate such theories.<ref>{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=441}}</ref><ref>
{{cite journal
  | last = Moore
  | first = Rebecca
  | title = Reconstructing Reality: Conspiracy Theories About Jonestown
  | journal = Journal of Popular Culture
  | volume = 36
  | issue = #2
  | date = Fall 2002
  | pages = 200–220
 | doi = 10.1111/1540-5931.00002
 | url = http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=16582
  | access-date = 1 July 2007
| url-access = subscription
  }}
</ref>

===Jones' declining physical and mental health===
Jones' health significantly declined in Jonestown. In 1978 he was informed of a possible lung infection, upon which he announced to his followers that he had [[lung cancer]] – a ploy to foster sympathy and strengthen support within the community.<ref>Goodlett, Carlton B. [http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=16978 ''Notes on Peoples Temple''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150205013831/http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=16978 |date=February 5, 2015}}, ''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University. Excerpted from ''The Need For A Second Look At Jonestown'', Rebecca Moore and Fielding M. McGehee, III, editors. [[Lewiston, New York]]: [[Edwin Mellen Press]], 1989.</ref>

Jones was said to be abusing injectable Valium, [[Quaalude]]s, [[stimulant]]s and [[barbiturate]]s.<ref name="reiterman446">{{Harvnb|Reiterman|Jacobs|1982|p=446}}</ref> Audio tapes of 1978 meetings exhibit Jones complaining of [[high blood pressure]], small [[stroke]]s, [[weight loss]] of thirty to forty pounds within the span of two weeks, temporary [[blindness]], [[convulsions]] and, in his final month, grotesque swelling of the [[Limb (anatomy)|extremities]].<ref name="reiterman446"/> During meetings and public addresses, Jones' once-sharp speaking voice often sounded slurred; words ran together or were tripped over. He would occasionally not finish sentences even when reading typed reports over the commune's speaker system.<ref name="reiterman446"/>

Reiterman was surprised by the severe deterioration of Jones' health when he saw him in Jonestown on November 17, 1978.<ref name="reitermantimes"/> After covering Jones for eighteen months for the ''Examiner'', he thought it was "shocking to see his glazed eyes and festering paranoia face to face, to realize that nearly a thousand lives, ours included, were in his hands."<ref name="reitermantimes"/>