{"id":13764,"date":"2013-02-17T21:49:02","date_gmt":"2013-02-17T21:49:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/alternativejonestown.com\/?page_id=13764"},"modified":"2026-02-13T15:11:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T23:11:13","slug":"index-3","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=13764","title":{"rendered":"The Freedom of Information Act and Jonestown"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/07-00-foi-graphic.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-92826\" src=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/07-00-foi-graphic.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"148\" height=\"156\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Many of the documents on this website \u2013 from the Jonestown censuses which provided the data for the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?post_type=who_died\">Who Died?<\/a>\u00a0list to the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?p=35667\">Edith Roller journals<\/a>, but most especially the documents in the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=13052\">Primary Sources<\/a> section \u2013 came from files released under\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.justice.gov\/oip\/foia_updates\/Vol_XVII_4\/page2.htm\">the Freedom of Information Act<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The following federal agencies have conducted probes into Peoples Temple and the Jonestown tragedy. As such, they have been the subjects of this site\u2019s greatest interest, and many records from the two agencies with the largest collections \u2013 the FBI and State Department \u2013 have been uploaded to the site. Records of the other agencies listed below are in the possession of the Jonestown Institute and will be added in the months to come.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"http:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?p=94902\">Federal Bureau of Investigation<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?p=94910\">Department of State<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=13688\">Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=130721\">Central Intelligence Agency<\/a> <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/images\/new2.jpg\" alt=\"NEW\" \/><br \/>\nU.S. Customs Service<br \/>\nDepartment of Defense<br \/>\nFederal Communications Commission<br \/>\nInternal Revenue Service<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>On numerous occasions during the 25-year history of Peoples Temple \u2013 and more especially in the three years following the deaths in Jonestown \u2013 Peoples Temple was the subject of queries and investigations by various agencies of the federal government. Many of the documents generated through those probes appear across this site. The documents include records of the investigations themselves as well as the Temple\u2019s own records which were collected by the agencies \u2013 most notably the FBI \u2013 along the way.<\/p>\n<p>The Freedom of Information Act, 5 USC 552 et seq., is a federal law which allows anyone to request these records, and with this law in hand, the managers of this site have filed scores of FOIA requests over the decades. While there are categories of information which the government may exempt from disclosure \u2013 such as records protected by national security and records the release of which would constitute an unwarranted invasion of privacy \u2013 most of the government\u2019s records on Peoples Temple and the Jonestown tragedy have been made available, through these requests.<\/p>\n<p>Articles about the Freedom of Information Act on this site include:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u2022 <a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=30216\">Materials Gathered by FBI RYMUR Investigation: Is There More?<\/a>, by Don Beck (2010)<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 <a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=16577\">Attempting to Document the Peoples Temple Story: The Existence and Disappearance of Government Records<\/a>, by Fielding M. McGehee III (2003)<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 <a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=32879\">Government Records Continue to Disappear<\/a>, by Fielding M. McGehee III (2003)<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 <a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=32952\">Many Questions Find Answers in Guyana<\/a>, by Jim Hougan (2002)<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 <a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=33002\">Jonestown Records Expunged, Lost<\/a>, by Fielding M. McGehee III (2001)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Array<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"parent":18,"menu_order":10,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-13764","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13764","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\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13764"}],"version-history":[{"count":39,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13764\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":130747,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13764\/revisions\/130747"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/18"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}