Seductive Poison

by Deborah Layton

  Meanwhile, more news about Larry fired in at us. He was indicted for murder, he would be tried, and if found guilty, he would be hung from the neck until pronounced dead. I steeled myself for more bad news. I was growing exhausted, distrustful, and numb. And still I had not mourned Mama’s passing.

  While the world listened and watched in horror, my universe crumbled. My brother Larry, the sweet conscientious objector to the Vietnam War, was imprisoned. How could this be? I was just as guilty of conspiracy against the United States Government as he was. Why Larry and not me? Why my brother, out of all the innocent humans unwittingly caught in the ingenious machinations of a madman?

  And as the months turned into years I made a pact with myself. I would never speak of it again. I would make it in this new world. I would make it on my own, by myself, and no one would ever know who I was …

  I began to weave a cocoon of anonymity around myself. Like Mama, I, too, felt safer inside my protective shield. And from this place of safety I grew stronger while learning the ways of the “outside” world.

  But I did not expect that my daughter would want to know, would need to know. For her, the losses from the Jonestown tragedy were manifold. She not only lost her grandmother, two aunts, and an unborn cousin, in many ways she also lost her uncle Larry, who remains in prison.

  I once thought I could and should keep my daughter’s legacy a secret from her. Just like my mother, who had lost her grandparents in Auschwitz and her mother by suicide, and who innocently believed that not telling her children would make our lives easier. But it didn’t. Quite the contrary, in many ways, I suspect, the sense that I could never get answers from my mother contributed to my seeking out a person who promised to have all the answers.

  When I began writing this book it was for my daughter, but as it grew I realized that I also had to tell this story for my mother, for her mother, and myself. I had to reveal the poisonous secrets handed down from mother to daughter. I felt compelled to come forward and confront my own guilt and shame in order to break the legacy of deception, of innocent, yet deadly deceit which had haunted my family for too long.

  Mama died in Jonestown ten days before the massacre, with Larry never leaving her bedside. She died without pain medication because Jim had consumed it himself. For two months Larry watched our mother drift away from life without any relief from her agony until she finally succumbed to her lung cancer. She was buried somewhere in the jungle, near Lynetta Jones, but the location is unknown. I wish she were nearby, so that my daughter and I could visit her. She was sixty-three years old.

  For years I would follow the backs of women who resembled my mother. I would walk for blocks trying to catch up with them, knowing that it was Mama, that she had survived and didn’t want anyone to know. It is only now as I write this that I realize I can no longer turn away and close my eyes. It is time to finally mourn the loss of Mama.

  I continue to dream of her and what pains me the most is that she will never know her granddaughter. She will never sit on my daughter’s bed and read her to sleep …

  Come away,

  Child, and play

  Light with the gnomies;

  in a mound

  Green and round

  That’s where their home is.

  Honey sweet,

  Curds to eat,

  Cream and frumenty,

  Shells and beads,

  Poppy seeds, You shall have plenty.

  But as soon as I stooped in the dim moonlight

  To put on my stocking and my shoe,

  The sweet, sweet singing died sadly away,

  And the light of the morning peeped through.…

  Epilogue

  Looking back, there are a few things I have come to learn. People do not knowingly join “cults” that will ultimately destroy and kill them. People join self-help groups, churches, political movements, college campus dinner socials, and the like, in an effort to be a part of something larger than themselves. It is mostly the innocent and naïve who find themselves entrapped. In their openhearted endeavor to find meaning in their lives, they walk blindly into the promise of ultimate answers and a higher purpose. It is usually only gradually that a group turns into or reveals itself as a cult, becomes malignant, but by then it is often too late.

  I hope my book will give my daughter some answers about how I got caught and how the Jonestown tragedy happened. I hope it will provide clues about the workings of a cult and shed light on the darkness of deceit. There are essential warning signs early on. Our alarm signals ought to go off as soon as someone tells us their way is the only right way.

  When our own thoughts are forbidden, when our questions are not allowed and our doubts are punished, when contacts and friendships outside of the organization are censored, we are being abused for an end that never justifies its means. When our heart aches knowing we have made friendships and secret attachments that will be forever forbidden if we leave, we are in danger. When we consider staying in a group because we cannot bear the loss, disappointment, and sorrow our leaving will cause for ourselves and those we have come to love, we are in a cult.

  If there is any lesson to be learned it is that an ideal can never be brought about by fear, abuse, and the threat of retribution. When family and friends are used as a weapon in order to force us to stay in an organization, something has gone terribly wrong. If I, as a young woman, had had someone explain to me what cults are and how indoctrination works, my story might not have been the same.

  For each of my friends and comrades, and for my family, the story has turned out differently.

  Stephan Jones, Jim’s son and my Offering Room buddy, had been assigned to Georgetown along with two of his brothers, Jimmy Junior and Tim, on another endeavor to impress the Guyanese government. Although they survived and are alive today and doing well, they lost their entire family and everyone they had ever known.

  Lee, my work crew leader, also lived, having been assigned as the chaperon and basketball coach for the last “presentation” games in Georgetown. He changed his name and lives with his family in California.

  Shanda, my friend, who showed me the ropes when I arrived at the encampment, died in Jonestown. At the young age of nineteen, Jim had her interned in the medical unit and kept her comatose after she bravely refused to continue in her role as one of his concubines.

  Robbi, my Offering Room comrade, who helped me with my workload when Mama was so ill, survived. After my escape I tried to reach her. I called the travel agent we had used to send people to Guyana, and explained to her what was happening in Jonestown. I had her call Robbi and pretend that Robbi needed to come in to correct a problem with the Temple’s ticket billing, but the San Francisco Temple’s staff were wary and refused to let Robbi go. Instead, she was immediately sent to Jonestown. She was one of the lucky few on assignment in Georgetown on November 18, but at the age of only nineteen, she lost her mother, father, seven siblings, and as many cousins.

  Lew, Jim’s eldest adopted son, his wife Beth, and their son Chioke died in Jonestown from cyanide poisoning. When their bodies were identified, Beth and Lew were holding each other and Chioke was lying between them. Lew and Beth were twenty-one years old.

  Karen Layton, vivacious and in love with Larry, was five and a half months pregnant with their child when she died of poisoning in Jonestown. She was twenty-nine years old.

  Gentle and kind Mary, the sorceress of delectable treats and Mama’s gift-maker, died without her family, alongside the other 913 members. Mary was seventy-eight years old.

  Annie, her sister Carolyn, Maria, John-John, and Kimo died in Jonestown, in Jim’s house. Annie died last, after writing a letter to the world:

  … Where can I begin—Jonestown—the most peaceful, loving community that ever existed, JIM JONES—the one who made this paradise possible—-much to the contrary of the lies about Jim Jones being a power-hungry, sadistic mean person who thought he was God—of all things.

  I want you who read
this to know Jim was the most honest, loving, caring, concerned person who I ever met and knew. His love for animals—each creature, poisonous snakes, tarantulas, none of them ever bit him because he was such a gentle person. He knew how mean the world was and he took any and every stray animal and took care of each one.

  His love for humans was insurmountable and it was many of those whom he put his love and trust in that left him and spit in his face. Teresa, Debbie Blakey—they both wanted sex from him which he was too ill to give. Why should he have to give them sex?—And Tim and Grace—also include them. I should know.

  I have spent these last few months taking care of Jim’s health. However, it was difficult to take care of anything for him. He always would do for himself.

  His hatred of racism, sexism, elitism, and mainly classism, is what prompted him to make a new world for the people—a paradise in the jungle. The children loved it. So did everyone else.

  We died because you would not let us live …

  —Annie—

  Annie and Maria were twenty-four years old. Carolyn was thirty-one. John-John and Kimo were both under six.

  It is believed that at Jim’s request Annie shot him in the head in the Pavilion, then made her way down to their cottage and wrote this note. She was found with a gun in her hand, a bullet through her temple, and enough poison in her body to make sure she would die.

  I find it interesting and sickening that Jim, the “great revolutionary” who espoused “death and sacrifice,” was in the end too terrified to die by the agonizingly painful poison he so eagerly gave his disciples.

  The saddest statement I can make about Annie’s letter is that I could have written it myself had I been there. The letter shows so clearly the state of mind of a person who cannot for a moment think for herself. Sweet Annie was an innocent, who never gained back the ability to reason, who, over the seven years of her involvement, like me, could only deny reality and idealize the person who demanded, then took, her life. What she did made complete sense in light of her beliefs. It is so easy to become our surroundings, our environment. Without clarity, we are our own deceivers.

  Sharon, Jim’s lieutenant, was the only person in Georgetown who abided by the order from Jonestown for everyone in the capital to kill themselves. She was forty years old. Her intense loyalty and adamant refusal to let her pre-Temple husband, one of the Concerned Relatives, see their children led her to kill them first. She slit their throats with a knife. They ranged in age from eighteen to eight years old.

  Teresa, my mentor, had been clever enough to work her way back into Jim’s good graces after my damning report on her. She escaped Jonestown in October under the pretense of working with Jim’s attorney on infiltrating the Concerned Relatives. I presume that was what she was doing in Washington when I saw her. She, too, did all she could to try and prevent the tragedy. I long ago heard she had a child, but I have never seen her since. I miss her and sincerely hope she is living well and in peace.

  Leo Ryan was killed along with three newsmen and a female defector by a group of youths who came to the airstrip on a flatbed truck believing they were killing the mercenaries who were endangering the lives of their families and friends. When their “heroic duty” was accomplished, these young boys returned to Jonestown and took the poison with their families.

  Mark Blakey had been assigned to the Temple’s boat and was on the high seas during the demise of his world. I had our marriage annulled on my return to the United States, but he wrote me letters and kept in contact for several months afterward.

  Dearest Debbie:

  After you left Guyana I really hated you, not especially for leaving me, but if you had seen how your mum took it. She blamed herself and her health started to deteriorate. It was not until I got back to Guyana that I found out why you had left. I am sure we’ll meet again someday. I know you did not like school in England, but those last two years of school were about the happiest time of my life. The early days of Jonestown were really exciting too, it’s just a pity that you had not been here then.

  Would you believe that the only reason I left Jonestown was that I thought we were really short of money and that the boat was a good money maker …

  Although the atmosphere at Jonestown had changed a lot I never thought it would come to this. After the last crisis Jones said he would never do it, as he did not have the right to do it to the children … Then there was a long period of relative peace and all kinds of big plans to go to the Soviet Union. I really loved Jonestown because I built it and saw it all from when there was still bush there. It was not until Jones got there that things got bad. If he really wanted to do something for Socialism he could not have done anything worse.

  Paula still feels very close to you … She said that she cried when you left and for that she was put under surveillance …

  God, I wish the hell I had known what was going on … If a few people had gotten together who knew what was going on we could have done the bastard in …

  Mark

  After a while he returned home to Northumberland, where he now runs his family’s farm.

  Paula continued in her role as mistress to Ambassador Lawrence “Bonny” Mann and had his baby. But, tragically, two years later when he learned more of the circumstances in which he had been used by Jim and ultimately—so he believed—by Paula, he killed her, their child, and then committed suicide. They lived in Bethesda, Maryland, where he had continued to serve as the Guyanese ambassador to the United States. Paula was twenty-eight years old.

  The only person held responsible for the insanity that befell the residents of Jonestown as well as the outsiders who had mistakenly believed they could come to Jonestown and help was my brother Larry Layton.

  My brother Larry remains imprisoned to this day, the sole individual held accountable for the crimes of Jim Jones. He was implicated in the conspiracy to kill Congressman Ryan by virtue of the fact that he, along with hundreds of other Jonestown residents, signed a petition stating that they were opposed to his visit. On the day of the massacre, Larry was told that CIA infiltrators who had posed as loyal Temple members were “defecting” with Ryan in order to bring about the invasion of Jonestown. He was instructed to pose as a defector and then shoot the pilot of their plane once it was in the air in order to crash it. Larry consented, believing that by sacrificing his own life in this way, he would be saving the lives of 900 others. He was told this would give them time to get to Cuba. However, Jones had arranged for the actual assassination to take place before the planes took off. In the confusion, Larry shot and wounded two people, neither fatally.

  Larry spent two years in a Guyanese dungeon before being tried and acquitted there. He was subsequently tried twice in the United States. His first trial ended in a hung jury voting 11-1 and 7-5 for acquittal, but the second trial resulted in conviction. Significantly, several prosecution witnesses, including the two people he shot and injured, begged for leniency for Larry, saying that he was not responsible for the insanity of the moment. So, too, did four of the jurors who had convicted him, as well as over fifty people who had been in Jonestown or who had lost loved ones there.

  Federal Chief Judge Robert F. Peckham presided over both U.S. trials. In sentencing Larry, he took into consideration the compelling factors described above and his own conclusions that:

  Jim Jones was primarily responsible for the deaths and injuries that occurred:

  Larry’s role in the conspiracy was less significant than that of a number of others—Larry did not participate in the shootings of the congressman, nor in the planning of the murders.

  Judge Peckham recommended that Larry serve no more than five years from the date of sentencing. The federal probation officer who had extensively researched the circumstances of Larry’s acts, interviewed dozens of people involved with the case, including psychiatrists and psychologists, and who wrote a lengthy presentencing report, also supported Chief Judge Peckham’s recommendation.

  In June 199
1, Larry appeared before the Federal Parole Commission and was denied parole. He was sentenced to serve another fifteen years before he could be reconsidered for parole. In arriving at this weighty decision, two examiners spent no more than several hours over a two-day period reviewing his trial and prison records as well as over 450 pages of documentation submitted on Larry’s behalf. During the subsequent hearing, the examiners repeatedly miscited the facts. Sadly, the considered judgement of a Chief Judge, the Honorable Robert F. Peckham, who spent sixteen months learning and deliberating the facts of the case, was dismissed. Larry’s release is not scheduled to be reviewed again by the Federal Parole Commission until the year 2004.

  Our papa turns eighty-four this year and will never again see his son a free man. Larry was thirty-one when he was arrested. He turns fifty-one this year.

  After Jonestown’s demise I met on numerous occasions with the Treasury Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the official, Robert Fabian, assigned to find the Temple funds Jim had stashed away in Switzerland, Barbados, Panama, and elsewhere.

  With my help the money was recovered and subsequently depleted. First, the government was reimbursed for shipping the bodies back to America and the Temple’s bills were paid off. Then, a monetary value was put on the lives of the deceased, and their relatives received a small compensation. John, for example, who lost his mother, sister, and adoptive father, received $14,000.

  Because Mama had passed away before the massacre, there was no value attached to the loss of her life.

  Acknowledgments

  I am grateful to Renate Stendhal, without whose belief, guidance, and mentoring I would never have been able to complete this long and arduous project. An author, writing consultant, and friend, Renate urged me to go far deeper into the darkness than I thought I could. With the aid of her remarkable insight and honesty, I was willing to grapple with the demons of my nightmares, to take hold of the tormenting shame and guilt which had kept me silent for so long, and to step out from behind the shadows of Jonestown and stand tall in the light once more.