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Mass Suicide, Murder Sweep Sect Cam eMr •,, HOME Edition The K no Price 15 Cents Copyright © 1978, The Knoxville News-Sentinelews Company Senitinel Issue No. 29,503 — 523-3131 Knoxville, Tenn. 37901, Monday Evening, November 20, 1978 82 Pages, Four sections , Mass Suicide, Murder Sweep Sect Cam.. nem Press Demand," GEORGETOWN, Guyana — A Guya- na government official said today the band of American religious fanatics who massacred Rep. Leo J. Ryan of California and four other Americans in his party had begun a wave of mass suicide and murder that left 400 persons dead and 600 missing. Guyana Minister of Information Shir- ley Field-Ridley said Guyanese troops today captured the headquarters of the People's Temple in the jungle city of Jonestown and Mend that some of the victims apparently were murdered. • Mrs. Field-Ridley told a news confer- ence that some of the victims "showed signs of violence, including presumed gunshot wounds, which were not consist- ent with suicide." She said some of the victims showed no signs of violence and were presumed to have been poison victims. She said a man who fled from the reli- gious community headed by a Califor- nian, Rev. Jim Jones, reached a polMe station in the jangled interior of Guyana and reported that leaders of the sect were preparing for a mass suicide by poisoning. Jones, 46, variously called himself the "prophet of God" and "father" and preached a flamboyant mixture of old- time faith healing, racial integration and socialism. Mrs. Field-Ridley said, "Some of the Americans Slaughtered on Airstrip bodies were found in homes, some were found in clearings in the forests, but no Bodies lie on a Guyana airstrip by the plane which members of the People's Temple. (UPI (c) 1978 San live persons were found . The troops was to carry them back to Georgetown. Rep. Leo Francisco Examiner) are searching for them." Ryan and four other Americans were massacred lay Mrs. Field-Ridley said troops had been unable to locate Jones, a former San Francisco Housing Authority director. Mrs Kathy Hunter, a free-lance Lane Warned writer from Ukiah, Calif., who a familiar with the People's Temple sect, said a scale abuses of members of the religious Guyanese parliament member had told Temple opened Cure with automatic group. weapons and shotguns as Ryan and his Rep. Ryan of her in a telephone conversation that The US. Representative, 53, was kill- Jones had committed suicide. party were boarding planes -at the Part ed by a shotgun blast as he attempted to Kaitimm airstrip, eight miles south of A California psychologist who accom- take several disenchanted members of panied Ryan to Guyana to try to get his Jonestown and ISO miles northwest of 'Persecution' the sect back to Georgetown by plane. Georgetown. daughter out of Jonestown said members A knife-wielding assailant had at- • By CLARK REID of the group rehearsed mass suicide and tempted to stab Ryan earlier while the In San Francisco, a People's Temple news...eel ...ea. Gorges...I signed undated suicide notes before they Representative was visiting Jonestown. spokesman who identified himself as WASHINGTON — Memphis lawyer left California. Two members of Ryan's group, including Archie James denied that members Of Mark Lane warned U.S. Rep. Leo J. "They will all be dead tomorrow," lawyer Mark Lane, disarmed the attack- the sect did the airport killings. Ryan (1)-Calif.) that "further persecu- said Stephen Katzaris, whose sun Antho- er, and Ryan was nut injured. lion" of an exiled religious group calling ny. 23, was critically wounded in the The dead included three newsmen Ryan, reporter Don Harris, 42,• and itself "The People's Temple" could result Saturday night attack in which Ryan, a and one of the settlement's defectors. cameraman Robert Brown, 36, both of in a "most embarrassing situation" for California Democrat, was killed. Ten persons were wounded, three seri- NBC News and both Los Angeles resi- dents; Gregory Robinson, 27, a photogra- the United States. Ryan, accompanied by aides, report- ously, and the husband of one of the • Ryan and four other Americans were ers, and relatives of some sect members, wounded had a stroke. The US. Embas- pher for The San Francisco Examiner, ' killed Saturday as they prepared to leave came to this former British colony on the sy said they were all Americans. and Patricia Parks or Parker, IA who was trying to escape from Jonestown, Jonestown, Guyana, after touring the UPI pa,. W Goa Ream. UPI ',anneal northeastern shoulder of South America Survivors of the attack said a band of People's Temple compound near th8te. Rep. Leo Ryan' Jim Jones last week to investigate reports of large= black and white members of the People's See 40e,p.FAD, Page A4 The California Representative ■ had fact. flown to Guyana on a congressional -Jr _ I I _t • A I• I • I EIJI '•- P ion flown to Guyana on a congressional tact• finding mission to determine whether any American .citizens were. being held Eyewitness Tells of Massacre, Nightmarish Watt tor Kescue against their will by the leader of the religious faction, former San Francisco They told as how Jim Jones had led The %Roaring eyewitness account 0 I crawled behind the right wheel of truckload. The reporters and cameramen the entire colony into making a maniacal politician Jim Jones. the killings In Gnyans was written by the plane. were told we would go out in the first suicide pact with him. Lane, who represents Jones, had San Premise. Chronicle reporter Ron Bob Brown stayed on his feet and batch, but Rep. Ryan would wait to leave They talked about storm of weapons accompanied Ryan's party en the tour. lavers, who was wounded Saturday In kept filming what was happening, even in 'W in the ao-called peaceful jungle miaslen. One news report indicated Lane also had the gunfire that killed Rep. Leo Ryan as the attackers advanced on him with hees=drel. ieved to be going. And whenever there was a crisis, been killed when the group was attacked and form others on a remote airstrip In their guns. Jones agreed that the 20 people who they recalled. Jones had assembled the by gunmen. State Department officials, Gamma. inners, who was en route to He was incredibly tenacious. wanted to could leave with us. lie even whole colony into a huge circular assesn however, indicate Lane escaped. Washington with the other woonded, While I was trying to decide whether said he thought they might be "better Lane's warning to Ryan was made in bly and mesmerized them into dictated the story to his city desk to stay where I was or risk the 100-yard- off" somewhere else if they no longer a letter dated Nov. 6,1978, and was wanted to slay in Jonestown. agreement. THE EDITOR. dash across the close-cropped gross field released today by Ryan's administrative to the jungle, I now Brown go down. Suddenly, there was a commotion in We understood then why there had By RON JAYERS been an ominous cheer from the People's assistant, Joe Holsinger. to sea Frew:Ks Chroalde Then I saw one of the attackers stick the central building that serves as the Temple residents at Jonestown before In that letter Lane charged that SAN JUAN, Puerto Rice (AP) - a shotgun right into Brown's face, inches colony's meeting place — a large st the young knife-wielder charged at "various agencies of the US. Govern- Jonestown is every evil thing that away, if that (Then the attacker shot ture with a tin roof and packed dirt floor. Ryan. ment have somewhat consistently op- everybody thought — and worse. him.) A cheer rang through the crowd. Daybreak — which am never expect- pressed the People's Temple Institution." We knew that before the shooting I'll never forget that sight as long as • Then, a young white man made a di- "Some of the members of the People's rect lunge at Ryan with a knife. ed to see, finally came. Started. At 8:30 a.m., the first batch of Guya- Temple have had to flee from the U.S.in The slaughter began at 4:20 p.M. I ran, and then I dived head-first into The blade was at Ryan's throat when nese troops arrived at Pert Kellum& order to experience a fuller opportunity Saturday (Guyana time) while we were the brush. Mark Lane and Charles Garry, Jones' They had flown to a landing field at to enjoy rights which were not available standing beside the twin-engine airplane I got up and sc-rambled as far into the attorneys and long-time supporters, to them within the U.S.," wrote Lane. Mathews Ridge about 30 miles away, and that had brought us to Pert Kailuma, swamp as I could. I was about 150 yards grabbed the weapon. were transported by buck about halfway The attorney implied that the alleged seven miles outside Jonestown, on from the airstrip and up to my waist in The attacker was cut before he could from the ridge to where were waiting. persecution was continuing in Guyana Friday and that had returned to pick as water. be disarmed. Then, to ensure themselves against and that the 1200-member cult had been I pushed through the rain forest, OPISshalsas And Ryan's shirt was drenched with 0P. being ambushed in exposed vehicles, "offered refuge" in two other countries. 1 was waiting between Bob Brown walking parallel to the runway, trying to the attacker's blood. Ron Javers they completed their march on foot Lane told Ryan that Jones and his and Don Harris, the two NBC men who figure out what had happened.
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