{"id":123613,"date":"2023-07-24T16:38:56","date_gmt":"2023-07-24T23:38:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=123613"},"modified":"2023-07-24T16:43:35","modified_gmt":"2023-07-24T23:43:35","slug":"templo-del-pueblo-jonestown-1980-1978-interview-with-mike-and-tim-carter-and-michael-prokes","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=123613","title":{"rendered":"Templo del Pueblo Jonestown 1980 [1978] Interview With Mike and Tim Carter and Michael Prokes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Transcriber\u2019s note<\/strong>: This is an exclusive Jonestown aftermath interview from the Argentine DiFilm archives in Spanish. Please note that the interview is incorrectly labeled as \u201c1980\u201d instead of 1978.<\/p>\n

The interview may be viewed on YouTube here: (8:41) Tim Carter – Michael Prokes – Mike Carter – Templo del Pueblo Jonestown 1980<\/a><\/p>\n

Alternatively, it may be viewed on Dailymotion here: Michael Prokes – Mike Carter – Temple of the Jonestown People 1980 – V\u00eddeo Dailymotion<\/a><\/p>\n

Brothers Mike and Tim Carter, along with Mike Prokes, managed to escape the Jonestown mass suicides after being assigned the task of delivering suitcases filled with money to the Soviet Embassy in Georgetown. The interview opens with the Carter brothers and Mike Prokes standing in the open veranda of the Park Hotel in Georgetown, Guyana. The reporter asks questions in Spanish and is assisted by a translator. All answers are given in English. This transcript features the untranslated Spanish questions as provided by DiFilm; however, a rough translation is explained by the translator.<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> (In Spanish) Tim Carter, Mike Prokes y Mike Carter, estos tres j\u00f3venes est\u00e1n acusados de haber sido hombres de confianza, allegados directos a Jim Jones. \u00bfCu\u00e1les son sus nombres?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He wants to know your names.<\/p>\n

Tim Carter:<\/strong> Tim Carter.<\/p>\n

Michael Prokes:<\/strong> Mike Prokes.<\/p>\n

Mike Carter:<\/strong> Mike Carter.<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfCu\u00e1nto tiempo llevaron en la secta Templo del Pueblo?<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> Six Years.<\/p>\n

Prokes:<\/strong> Same.<\/p>\n

Mike C:<\/strong> Five years.<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfPorque tambi\u00e9n?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He wants to know why you belong to the group\u2014how come you belong to the group.<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> When I first met Jim Jones I thought he was a humanitarian and that the work that the group was doing was good. It was helping people who were poor and oppressed.<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> (Unintelligible)<\/p>\n

Prokes:<\/strong> Basically the same reason. I came as a news reporter for a CBS television affiliate station in California to do a story on Jim Jones and I\u2014I liked what I saw being done to help people so I quit my job and joined.<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> (To Mike Carter) \u00bfY t\u00fa?<\/p>\n

Mike C:<\/strong> Um\u2014well my brother had already been in the Temple. I was just in high school at the time and\u2014and I had come down for a visit and I saw\u2014uh what seemed to be a very pleasant lifestyle. Something where I could put my energies to good work and help people. Uh and so that\u2019s why I joined.<\/p>\n

(Camera zooms in on Mike Prokes)<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfC\u00f3mo explican el vuelco que dio la personalidad de Jones, la terminaci\u00f3n que tuvo esta historia?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Okay. He wants to know how do you explain that the things turned the way they did. How come a good thing became such a bad thing?<\/p>\n

(Camera zooms in on Tim Carter)<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> I don\u2019t know. That\u2019s a good question. It\u2019s uh\u2014a nightmare. Jim Jones was uh, a man who cut himself off from the world. Who became more and more paranoid and uh\u2014totally, I\u2014I just I don\u2019t know. I don\u2019t understand it. All that I know is that everything disintegrated in one day.<\/p>\n

Footage plays of Jim Jones preaching to Temple members<\/em><\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfEllos estaban muy cerca, eran amigos de Jones?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He wants to know if you were close to Jim Jones.<\/p>\n

Tim C: <\/strong>We were considered to be close to Jim Jones. We weren\u2019t\u2014as it turns out\u2014I don\u2019t think anybody was really close to Jim Jones because nobody ever got that close to him.<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Okay.<\/p>\n

Reporter: <\/strong>\u00bfUna versi\u00f3n dice que ellos partieron de la secta con una valija que conten\u00eda d\u00f3lares y una carta para un embajador sovi\u00e9tico?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Okay. So according to what he\u2019s saying, it is said that you ran away with a bag filled of money and according to what he says again, you were bound for the Soviet Union. What is there in that?<\/p>\n

Audible laugh in background.<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> Well, it\u2019s a little bit of a mis\u2014miscommunication. (Camera zooms in on Tim) It’s true that we had a suitcase of money that\u2014we were asked to\u2014when we were approached by a woman whose financial secretary[1] <\/sup><\/a> of the uh church\u2014it was before this mass suicide had started.<\/p>\n

Translator<\/strong>: Yeah.<\/p>\n

Tim C<\/strong>: And while we were in the process of delivering an empty suitcase to the house where Jim Jones lived, I had gone to get some water to take with us and I heard a lot of screaming and crying. And I uh\u2014went to the pavilion to see what was happening and I saw a lot of uh\u2014mothers crying, holding their children and uh people laying on the ground. And I saw my wife holding my son who was dead\u2014my fifteen-month-old baby. And my wife was dying and I went up and\u2014and I hugged her. And at that point I knew that if I stayed, I would die but we had a way out and so we took it. And on the way to Port Kaituma we\u2014I told them that they had started killing themselves and he [Prokes] had been told that somebody had gone after Congressman Ryan\u2019s truck and it was just a matter of survival and we happened to be picked out. We did not know that the money was bound for the Soviet Embassy until we were a mile and half away from Jonestown (Footage is shown from the Jonestown body airlift and the Port Kaituma shooting aftermath)<\/em> and we had never intended to do anything but to save our lives. (whispering) So it was circumstantial more than anything.<\/p>\n

Prokes<\/strong>: Turned ourselves in\u2014<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfD\u00f3nde est\u00e1 la maleta y el dinero?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Okay, the sixty-thousand dollar question: where is that bag?<\/p>\n

(Camera zooms in on Tim)<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> He [Mike Carter] took the police back to the neck. We had no idea how much money we were carrying until they told us. We\u2014we did not know and we cannot care. We took them back the next day because we\u2014along the way\u2014because we\u2019re running for our lives. We did not even carry it with us. We dumped the bag\u2014<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> (Unintelligible)<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Uh\u2014they want to know if by now, you know how much money was involved.<\/p>\n

Tim:<\/strong> We were told\u2014we were told\u2014we found out actually through the media that how much\u2014that how much we did not\u2014<\/p>\n

Footage plays of what appears to be the Peoples Temple San Francisco Headquarters <\/em><\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfSe drogaban en la secta, era una secta de drogadictos?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He wants to know if people took drugs in this group.<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> No.<\/p>\n

Prokes:<\/strong> Wasn\u2019t permitted.<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> No smoking. No drinking.<\/p>\n

Mike C:<\/strong> None\u2014none known\u2014yeah.<\/p>\n

(Camera zooms in on Mike Prokes)<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfJones no se drogaba?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He wants to know if Jones, well taking drugs\u2014<\/p>\n

(Camera pans to Tim Carter)<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> That\u2019s what I understand. I did not know that personally until just until this whole thing had happened.<\/p>\n

Footage plays of the Jonestown pavilion and its victims<\/em><\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfEllos asistieron a algunos de los ensayos del c\u00f3ctel de la muerte?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He wants to know\u2014there (Shakes head)\u2014have been told that there were some rehearsals with the famous drink\u2014that was poisonous or not.\u00a0 Is this story true?<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> It was true but I wasn\u2019t there. My brother was there.<\/p>\n

(Camera pans to Mike Carter)<\/p>\n

Mike C:<\/strong> Um I never\u2014they\u2019ve gone through drills before\u2014never ever drinking anything. But uh it\u2019s sort of a psychological uh play-on-the-mind to see you know\u2014never\u2014never drinking anything actually.<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Yeah.<\/p>\n

(Camera pans to Tim Carter)<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> I think you should know that I lost a wife, a son, and a sister, my brother-in-law, my nephew. He [Mike Carter] lost his wife and son, and he [Prokes] lost a son.<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Yeah.<\/p>\n

(Camera pans over to Mike Prokes and Tim Carter)<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfTu como ex periodista de CBS como puedes definir esto que ha ocurrido?<\/p>\n

Footage plays of casualties from the Port Kaituma airstrip shooting and of Jackie Speier<\/em><\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He would like for you to say what do you think of the whole thing. How can you define this\u2014what happened?<\/p>\n

Mike C: <\/strong>Yeah.<\/p>\n

Tim C: <\/strong>I don\u2019t know\u2014<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> (Unintelligible)<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> As a journalist, or ex-journalist (referring to Prokes), how would you word it?<\/p>\n

Prokes: <\/strong>Rephrase the question.<\/p>\n

(Unintelligible)<\/p>\n

Prokes:<\/strong> I think to me\u2014the concept of the Temple and what was happening\u2014it started out as a dream and it turned into an absolute nightmare.<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfCu\u00e1l es el titulo que le pondr\u00edas a toda esta historia?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> If you had to put a title to the story what would it be?<\/p>\n

Audible laugh in background.<\/p>\n

Prokes:<\/strong> I think you could put\u2014I think you\u2014I think you could put a million titles to it.<\/p>\n

Tim C: <\/strong>I don\u2019t think anything like this ever happened.<\/p>\n

Translator: <\/strong>No. It has never happened anywhere.<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> I don\u2019t think there\u2019s a word in the English language to describe how grotesque, how horrible, how monstrous, how senseless, what a waste, what a tragedy, and what a crime it was.<\/p>\n

Translator<\/strong>: Yeah.<\/p>\n

Footage plays of the Jonestown pavilion and its residents<\/em><\/p>\n

Prokes: <\/strong>There can never be one headline to cover everything\u2014all the ramifications of what took place.<\/p>\n

(Camera zooms in on Prokes)<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> Please, please, no more.<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Yeah, I\u2019m trying to cut him down.<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfHubo asesinatos a parte de los suicidios?<\/p>\n

Footage plays of reporters surveying the Jonestown aftermath<\/em><\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He wants to know if\u2014or beyond the suicides, there was\u2014<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> This is the last question?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> Yes. That there was gunning. That there were people killed by gun.<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> We understand that three people died by gunshot wounds.<\/p>\n

Footage plays of the Jonestown victims<\/em><\/p>\n

(Camera zooms in on Prokes)<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> \u00bfSaben quienes fueron los responsables de esas muertes?<\/p>\n

Translator:<\/strong> He is asking again, do you know the people who did the shooting?<\/p>\n

Tim C:<\/strong> We were not there. That is all. Okay. Okay.<\/p>\n

Reporter:<\/strong> Gracias.<\/p>\n

Tape ends.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Note:<\/strong><\/p>\n

[1]<\/sup><\/a> Tim is referring to Maria Katsaris\u2014a Temple secretary and treasurer\u2014who was presumed to be a part of Jim Jones\u2019 inner-circle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Transcriber\u2019s note: This is an exclusive Jonestown aftermath interview from the Argentine DiFilm archives in Spanish. Please note that the interview is incorrectly labeled as \u201c1980\u201d instead of 1978. The interview may be viewed on YouTube here: (8:41) Tim Carter – Michael Prokes – Mike Carter – Templo del Pueblo Jonestown 1980 Alternatively, it may […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"parent":123586,"menu_order":3,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-123613","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/123613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=123613"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/123613\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":123617,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/123613\/revisions\/123617"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/123586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=123613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}