Q662 Summary

Summary prepared by Fielding M. McGehee III. If you use this material, please credit The Jonestown Institute. Thank you.

To read the Tape Transcript, click here. Listen to MP3 (Side 1, Side 2).
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FBI Catalogue Jones Speaking

FBI preliminary tape identification note: One Craig 90/ News April 11, 1978

Date cues on tape: Contents of tape consistent with identification note

People named:

Bible verses cited: None

Summary:

(This tape was transcribed by Katherine Hill. The editors gratefully acknowledge her invaluable assistance.)

Jim Jones reads the news for April 11, 1978.

While most of the tape is devoted to the newscast, Jones does issue a few directives for the residents of Jonestown to follow. The most significant is his request that all people must turn in their lists of personal property to Central Supply, a demand he makes at both the beginning and the end of the tape. There are additional details to the order: at the beginning, he notes that those people who have been found guilty of theft in the past will have their lists posted for all to see; at the end, he says that people have a two-hour amnesty – beginning at that moment – to turn over anything that is not theirs to Central Supply.

To make sure the lists are accurate and match what the people say they own, Jones says that people from Central Supply will have the authority to inspect anyone’s possessions, at any time, and without notice. Again, those under greatest scrutiny will be those who have been involved in thefts in the past.

Jones defends the policy in a couple of ways. He insists that it is one thing to steal things “from big stores, corporations which can clearly be shown are properties of the bourgeoisie and the ruling class. But,” he continues, “to steal from your own fellow comrade is stealing people’s property that’s to be shared equally and will be considered the most heinous and horrendous and disgusting of crimes against the people. It will be stopped.”

The use of his staff for surprise inspections has a precedent as well. While Jones regularly criticizes the CIA and other agencies which spy on American citizens, he differentiates those from an intelligence branch of a nation which defends the social orders and protects the people.  “Our social order,” he concludes, “is clearly proven to protect the people.”

Given the repetition of this demand and the animation in Jones’ voice, it is apparent that something has triggered the issue, but he does not specify the cause.

As with other news tapes, this one includes a number of editorial comments along the way. Some of them are Jones’ spontaneous reactions (“Thus is the corruption that we see constantly of racism all around us,” he says after a pause following the story of a rich landlord who shot a deaf-mute boy. “It’s disgusting. Most disgusting. No way to describe it”). Other comments are less clear in their origin, especially when they seem to be read in the same tone of voice as the news item itself, so they may reflect the slant of the news service he is quoting. In describing New York’s cutbacks to hospitals in New York, for example, he reads/predicts that “170,000 patients are now confined to death because there will be no assistance for them.” At another point, in describing tobacco company opposition to a new anti-smoking program, Jones refers to their lobbyists as representing “powerful tobacco corporations that also have their hands, according to many authorities, in dope, particularly marijuana, production of napalm and other merciless, barbaric, and inhumane military types of warfare equipment that have destroyed children from Vietnam to Africa.”

Jones does find ways to link the items in the news to concerns in Jonestown. When he first mentions the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, he reminds his listeners that the agency was “one of our conspirators that has tried to hold back our checks and has held back upwards of 60,000 US dollars in checks we need for this commune badly, desperately, so that we can buy a boat.” Later, in enumerating Rupert Murdoch’s attacks on “progressive forces in liberalism” – ranging from Jimmy Carter to the Black Panthers to Synanon – he adds Peoples Temple to the list, since Murdoch owns New West magazine, and they all remember New West magazine.

Among the new items which Jones reads:

• New York bus driver shoots passengers
• Parents of a 14-year-old murder victim return to Italy after the girl’s murderer is released from jail on bond.
• A deaf-mute boy is shot and killed by landlord in New York
• Governor of New York proposal for large cuts to medical funding to leave many minorities unable to receive medical care
• President Carter hosts peace negotiations between Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin
• Carter advisor Bert Lance criticized by Publisher Rupert Murdoch
• News columnist William F. Buckley’s support of conservatives
• Violence at US abortion clinics
• German film company present Adolf Hitler in a positive light
• Opposition to Nazi march planned in Skokie, Illinois
• HEW’s anti-smoking campaign
• US Supreme Court to rule on controversial Pennsylvania abortion law
• Conflict between LAPD and Progressive Labor Party
• Revisionist Communist Party reverses position on ERA
• Countries take a stand against apartheid in South Africa
• Crime, infant death, child abuse statistics
• FBI defying court orders regarding FOIA
• Civil conflict in Zimbabwe (Rhodesia)
• Frank Collin heads US Nazi Party
• US plan to name a museum after Marcus Garvey
• Value of US dollar is dropping, danger of capitalist system collapsing

The transcript also includes a short book review from The New York Times – and accompanying commentary on the capitalistic nature of the Times – of Dr. Jan Schreiber’s book The Ultimate Weapon: Terrorists and World Order.

FBI Summary:

Date of transcription: 3/7/79

In connection with the FBI’s investigation into the assassination of U.S. Congressman LEO J. RYAN at Port Kaituma, Guyana, South America, on November 18, 1978, a tape recording was obtained. This tape recording was located in Jonestown, Guyana, South America, and was turned over to U.S. Officials in Guyana and subsequently transported to the United States.

On March 2, 1979, Special Agent (name deleted) reviewed the tape numbered 1B47-107. This tape was found to contain the following:

Side one of tape number 107 consisted of Reverend JONES giving a speech on the social order at Jonestown. Reverend JONES also gave a politicized interpretation of current world events.

Side two of tape number 107 consisted of Reverend JONES giving a politicized interpretation of current world events. Nothing was contained thereon which was considered to be of evidentiary nature or beneficial to the investigation of Congressman RYAN.

Differences with FBI Summary:

The summary is accurate and meets the FBI’s purposes.

Tape originally posted July 2011