Introduction<\/p>\n
In all the years following the Jonestown Tragedy, no one but me has ever even suggested that it may not<\/strong> have been Peoples Temple who killed the congressman. I\u2019ve not only suggested it \u2013 I\u2019ve claimed<\/em> it.<\/p>\n But to have now surfaced proof<\/em> <\/strong>with the chance to revise, not simply revisit history, is a landmark breakthrough that goes well beyond me, as was always the intent.<\/p>\n We shall now proceed to examine that proof, as well as to weave it into the largely-hidden context of that time.<\/p>\n As always, any breakthrough on this subject is still tempered with sorrow; yet given a scenario that so boggles the mind both then and now, any clarity might still be counted as a gift.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n This Claim Shall Prevail<\/p>\n Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a copy of the Zapruder film in your own home, so you could piece together the assassination of John F. Kennedy for yourself, to see how many shots there were and where they came from?<\/p>\n At least with the Kennedy assassination, we\u2019ve had lingering public doubt. Tracks covered, disappearing evidence, shrouded in rationales that few believe. Enough was revealed to be sure of what we didn\u2019t<\/em> know, so at least we\u2019ve known enough to question.<\/p>\n By contrast, there was little public disclosure with the assassination of Congressman Leo Ryan beyond, \u201cThey did it!,\u201d \u201cthey\u201d of course being Peoples Temple. Horror, shock, and the death of the \u201cpresumptive assassins\u201d precluded any real inquiry.<\/p>\n Yet with this<\/em> assassination, we finally have the equivalent of the Zapruder film and more \u2013 and astoundingly, right in people\u2019s homes! Through the recent explosion of Jonestown-inspired media, combined with our modern DVD\u2019s and DVR\u2019s and TV specials, thousands of people now do<\/strong> have \u201csmoking guns\u201d regarding Ryan\u2019s death that they never had for Kennedy\u2019s.<\/p>\n They just haven\u2019t been told yet where to look or what to look for. I am now about to do that.<\/p>\n This claim shall prevail.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n What Constitutes Proof<\/p>\n There are many ways to prove allegations. There is direct proof, like fingerprints on a gun or a surveillance photograph at an ATM machine. \u201cGrade A Proof,\u201d sometimes called \u201ca smoking gun.\u201d<\/p>\n Then there is circumstantial proof, like everything seeming to incriminate a certain suspect. There is testimonial proof, such as an eyewitness identification or a recollection of a conversation. There is written proof, such as a trail of e-mails.<\/p>\n We say something is \u201cproven\u201d when someone is convicted by a jury of their peers, but even that can be subject to error. It is a judgment based upon available evidence. Sometimes we are not sure what indisputable proof is. Sometimes we don\u2019t even think that proof matters.<\/p>\n Other matters are never tried, just left to the court of public opinion. Media hype, chaos, no trace of other culprits, the deep dark jungle. Everyone knows they did it, who else would do it, they were all crazy weren\u2019t they. Isn\u2019t it obvious?<\/p>\n Or the real winner, what the congressional committee told me personally: \u201cWhy bother to blow up the film to identify the assassins? [Everyone knows that] All the principals are dead.\u201d<\/p>\n I do understand that there were several parties from Peoples Temple gunning for the congressman that day. Ujara (Don Sly) wielded a knife, Larry Layton toted a handgun, vigilantes confirmed the kill. Jim Jones was crazed, and furious that the congressman had come at all.<\/p>\n Besides, Jones killed kids so he could have killed anyone. Guilty. Case closed.<\/p>\n But as even formerly avid viewers of Murder, She Wrote<\/em> can attest: There may be several suspects, but only one of them got the job done. As often as not, someone who stationed themselves in a darkened room with secret motives and a front of respectability to protect.<\/p>\n To date, no one but me has even suggested that it was not<\/em> Peoples Temple who killed the congressman. I base my claim after having viewed film footage all the way back in 1979 that I myself believed was later confiscated.<\/p>\n It should be noted that prior to the first anniversary \u2013 when I saw the NBC assassination film footage on WPIX-NY 10 o\u2019clock News (perhaps its only airing) \u2013 I too believed that our own people had killed the congressman. I had believed it for a whole year. I reversed course solely based on that film footage.<\/p>\n As I spelled out in \u201cPeoples Temple Was NOT a Cult of Assassins,\u201d I viewed that deadly footage alongside a non-People Temple Army veteran who identified the \u201csquad diamond\u201d attack formation. Chris Kice, wife of accused assassin Tom Kice, was also there. She peered at the screen and said, \u201cI don\u2019t see Tom. None of those men are Tom.\u201d<\/p>\n My previous article includes many facts and one damning document which created a circumstantial <\/em>case. That document, the U.S. government\u2019s own log confirming that the CIA was into Jonestown at 3 a.m. that very morning, infers that the CIA may well have been<\/em> responsible <\/em>for the assassination just hours before, especially since no one else, Guyanese or American, was able to get into the area until after dawn.<\/p>\n Yet even I realized that any \u201cGrade A Proof\u201d would probably never re-surface. I just pursued it out of conscience. I felt I owed it to the dead and I did not want to live in a land of lies.<\/p>\n But proof? I did not expect direct<\/em> evidence, such as the film footage now in hand. Not likely. Well, until now.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n What Happened to the Primary Evidence at the Time?<\/p>\n When a crime is filmed on site, that has to count as primary evidence, \u201cGrade A Proof.\u201d It would seem inexplicable that such evidence would not have been scrutinized and on-site witnesses, as well as surviving members of Peoples Temple, asked to identify the killers.<\/p>\n As Ron Javers, a reporter on site standing next to NBC cameraman Bob Brown, reported following the tragedy: \u201cBob Brown\u2026. kept filming what was happening, even as the attackers advanced on him with their guns. He was incredibly tenacious.\u201d<\/p>\n Indeed, that is what I saw that night on WPIX-NY. Brown\u2019s filming did not go into \u201csnow\u201d until one of the attackers came right up onto Brown\u2019s camera lens and killed him.<\/p>\n I was so alarmed at seeing a professional military hit and with no one identifiable from Peoples Temple, that I arranged an interview with the congressional investigating committee in Washington, D.C. on January 3, 1980 to demand that they blow up the footage of the faces and either identify or rule out the killers as having been from Jonestown.<\/p>\n Yet even after admitting that yes, they had the film, they dismissed me with, \u201cWhy do that? All of the principals are dead.\u201d When I asked who the government eyewitness was, I was told that it was former Temple member and defector Jim Cobb. When I asked how could he identify eight men come towards him with guns when he was fleeing in the other direction, I was told, \u201cHe said he had good eyesight.\u201d<\/p>\n Actually it was worse. Cobb told the FBI that he had first fled<\/strong> \u201cfifty yards\u201d(!!)<\/em><\/strong> before he \u201clooked back and observed\u201d killings at \u201cpoint blank range.\u201d \u201cPoint blank range\u201d equals \u201cfifty yards\u201d??? Was this \u201cgood eyesight\u201d Superman vision?<\/p>\n But didn\u2019t anyone else identify any specific person shooting any specific person? Categorical answer: No<\/strong>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Re-emergence of Evidence Believed to Have Been Confiscated<\/p>\n As is well known, there has been a burst of new publicity about the Jonestown Tragedy in just the last few years. Much has been re-hashed, not really re-examined, but survivors have nevertheless been grateful for a new chance to address old wounds.<\/p>\n What was not expected by anyone \u2013 including me \u2013 was the re-emergence of the assassination film footage. Now, however, at least the first few seconds of that footage has publicly resurfaced.<\/p>\n I can use those few seconds of film footage to now prove that it wasn\u2019t Peoples Temple who killed the congressman. This newly-resurfaced evidence will be dispositive<\/em>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n What Proof Will Be Offered<\/p>\n This crime (namely and specifically, the assassination) was never reviewed in a court of law or even public hearings. Nevertheless, given the massive publicity, the involvement of the FBI and the lack of challenges, it is widely considered \u201csettled.\u201d<\/p>\n Thus claiming that \u201cIt was never investigated in the first place,\u201d however true (!!), does not remove the burden of a high bar to have it reviewed now. Like if it wasn\u2019t this<\/em> culprit, where is the photo of \u201cthe real culprit\u201d to hold up against the accused? That\u2019s a high bar.<\/p>\n But I have that. I have it and much more. And if you want to go there first, by all means. It\u2019s at \u201cEyewitness Identifications?\u201d<\/p>\n You will still have questions. Because there is nothing about this subject that is \u201cflat.\u201d Like the bank was robbed, who robbed the bank, you got the wrong culprit, here\u2019s the guy who did it. This subject is more convoluted than that. But let us finally put primary evidence first<\/strong>:<\/p>\n There is that direct<\/em> proof, yes \u2013 matching the real culprits against the accused. There is also deductive<\/em> proof \u2013 like if the vehicle used in the attack was not from Jonestown (indeed, as we will prove, it was a vehicle never sold anywhere<\/em> \u2013 not even properly \u201ca tractor\u201d!) then its occupants could not have been from Jonestown either. That in itself is surely \u201cbeyond reasonable doubt.\u201d<\/p>\n Then there is logistical<\/em> proof. Key to that is reconstruction of the crime scene<\/strong>. (Wasn\u2018t that done? No. Never!<\/em>) The graphic physical layout of where everyone was and what they did, the sequence of events, the timing, and where \u201call the pieces on the chessboard\u201d moved during those few horrifying minutes.<\/p>\n Nor has anyone ever examined what the assassins did prior to charging forwards. The perfectly-executed and coordinated military maneuvers. Even those few seconds now available reveal trained professional assassins, hardly \u201cad hoc vigilante cult crazies.\u201d No one could have done this without practice, coordination, and pre-planning to the nth degree.<\/p>\n I am decoding all of that. I have set up five pictorial sections with \u201cThe Vehicle Used in the Attack,\u201d \u201cLogistics: Prelude to a Frame,\u201d \u201cLogistics: Military Execution,\u201d \u201cLogistics: Post-Ops Scenario\u201d and \u201cEyewitness Identifications?\u201d<\/p>\n However, in recognition of the complexities, emotions and entrenched views surrounding Jonestown, we will now provide a backdrop to those demonstrations step-by-step; as well as begin to address what questions will inevitably arise.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Backdrop of News Reports of the Time<\/p>\n There were eyewitness reports from the Port Kaituma killings that never pointed to Peoples Temple in the first place. It was clearly a professional hit, executed silently, methodically, brutally. Beyond the capabilities of ad hoc vigilantes from Jonestown:<\/p>\n The religious zealots struck silently\u2026. They murdered methodically. Nobody said anything, they just opened fire. \u2026..Witnesses described the massacre as carefully planned and mercilessly executed.. Three policemen showed up but were disarmed\u2026 Someone shot out the left tire of the airplane. People walking through with guns\u2026. They were not running or anything \u2013 walking, just walking. (Seattle Times, <\/em>November 20, 1978)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The vehicle which brought the assassins was reported to have sped away after the shots, while the gunmen were reported to have fled into the bush. So the vehicle was apparently no means of transport to or from any community.<\/p>\n Not only were \u201cthree policemen \u2026 disarmed,\u201d but another reporter appealed for help to \u201csoldiers with M-16\u2019s who refused to intervene.\u201d Why was that? Surely it wasn\u2019t penniless ad hoc vigilantes who had the power to wave a magic wand and make the Guyanese police and military disappear.<\/p>\n Jackie Speier, Ryan\u2019s aide on site, noticed the oddity that Richard Dwyer, reputed CIA agent planted in the State Department, fell face up rather than face down \u2013 she speculated so as to be recognized and spared! Were the killers from Jonestown rather than government vintage, that would make no sense.<\/p>\n A chief forensic expert involved in the autopsies stateside who examined the bodies confirmed that the congressman was killed with dum-dum bullets (which shatter upon impact so as to be untraceable), which the community had no capacity to manufacture.<\/p>\n News reports stated that Annie Moore, a Temple nurse, was also killed by a dum-dum bullet that was speculated to have come from the same gun as killed the congressman. So unless the dum-dum bullets came from Jonestown (most unlikely!), was Annie shot by non-Temple killers who were first killed the congressman, then came to Jonestown later that night?<\/p>\n We do have the official U.S. government log confirming that the CIA was radioed directly from on site at Jonestown to confirm the deaths at 3:29 a.m. that very morning. In a remote locale that no one else got into the area at all until after dawn; and even at that, not into Jonestown.<\/em><\/p>\n Other coverage revealed that Stanley Clayton, who had escaped the ordeal, told the Matthews Ridge Grand Jury that a group of men had entered Jonestown with shouts \u201cforty five minutes after the community fell silent\u201d(!); and that some time later he heard several shots.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Ms. Moore\u2019s body was embalmed prior to autopsy<\/em>, making identification of a poisoning agent impossible. She could have been poisoned in the death ritual, then shot with a dum-dum bullet from \u201cunknown assassins\u201d from Port Kaituma, and no one would even know.<\/p>\n Jim Jones was reported to have been shot through the left side of his head, but he was right-handed.<\/p>\n Much less \u201cthe great injections fiasco.\u201d The operative words there are \u201ccontaminated crime scene\u201d \u2013 not something normally done by the dead<\/em> people!!<\/p>\n There were pieces here, there, everywhere, that were never examined or questioned. The above examples barely scratch the surface of investigations that should have been, but were never done.<\/p>\n So we need to step back and realize that we may have more questions than answers, even shy of any proof we might call \u201cdispositive.\u201d Questions and challenges: Few. Answers: None.<\/p>\n Also note that everyone but<\/em> the CIA visitors were barred from Jonestown for two days \u2013 even, apparently, the Army Medevac team! The bodies were left to rot in a black-out of time that spoke of a clandestine military operation far more than of a humanitarian catastrophe. <\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Eyewitness Identifications of the Gunmen?<\/p>\n I suppose that the public long since assumed that the Port Kaituma killers were positively identified. The truth is the opposite. There were no<\/strong> viable eyewitness identifications.<\/p>\n Yes, of course there were men from Jonestown put on \u201cthe assassins list\u201d who had been at the airstrip both prior and following the killings. Yet any assumptions that it was they who committed the assassination were not only misleading, but demonstrably false:<\/p>\n As we shall prove, unknown gunmen disembarked from a tractor-trailer that could not have come from Jonestown (or, I repeat, from anywhere<\/em>! Not a farm vehicle!!) and began shooting. And who claimed that they looked into those<\/em> faces as they were advancing for the kill?<\/p>\n Not even defectors who knew Temple members by sight claimed that. Ex-Temple member and \u201cgovernment eyewitness\u201d Jim Cobb (note: the only<\/strong> eyewitness claiming to have identified \u201cPeoples Temple killers\u201d in any specific killing) admitted fleeing for his life in the other direction! Cobb is also on film saying that \u201chis back was turned\u201d when the shooting began so he did not see<\/em> any vehicle approaching. He said he also \u201cdid not hear<\/em> any vehicle approach\u201d because of the sound of the plane\u2018s engines revving up.! Then he saw victims fall and he first fled fifty yards away<\/em><\/strong> before (allegedly) observing specific shooters \u201cat point blank range<\/em>\u201d!!<\/strong><\/p>\n And the FBI report has Cobb reporting that \u201cwhile the tractor and trailer were at a distance, he was able to identify certain individuals as being hitmen for Peoples Temple\u201d!<\/p>\n Anyone can check the \u201cEyewitness Identifications?\u201d section to verify that in fact, Mr. Cobb could not have seen anyone<\/em> he claimed to have seen killing anyone. That\u2019s verified using on-site film<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n Or check the whole 417-page fiasco produced by the FBI full of so-called eyewitness identifications and floods of names. Everyone saw someone. They saw this one on the truck, they saw that one on the tractor, they saw that one on the trailer. In fact, the same names keep repeating like a bad meal in redux. They just never saw any of those people they \u201ceyewitness-identified\u201d killing<\/em> anyone!! <\/strong><\/p>\n Yes, they saw the ones they mentioned. Yes, they may have seen shooting, at least fleetingly. Many eyewitnesses even said that the gunmen shot from the tractor or shot from the trailer (or from \u201cthe truck\u201d or from \u201cthe wagon\u201d) and did not even know that anyone had disembarked!<\/em> Yet they could give specific names?? That kind of mess qualifies as a legal investigation of the assassination of a U.S. Congressman?<\/p>\n No one but<\/em> Cobb even claimed to see any specific Peoples Temple shooter close up shooting any specific person. Nor did the FBI ask. Nor did anyone ask. Not ever.<\/p>\n And if you think I am implying unquestioning mass blanket misidentifications <\/strong>of assassins of a U.S. Congressman on the part of the FBI, know that I am not \u201cimplying\u201d it \u2013 I am claiming<\/em> it. I\u2019ve proven it in \u201cEyewitness Identifications?\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Edith Parks, a Jonestown defector at the airstrip, a woman of practical intelligent common sense, said in the TV special Biography<\/em> of the Jonestown tractor parked at the side of the airfield: \u201cIt drove up. It didn\u2019t worry me because I knew the ones on it. But here<\/em> [meaning the attack vehicle] the men were hid<\/em>. Then they stood up and started shooting\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n Wait a minute. Wasn\u2019t that supposed to be just one<\/strong> vehicle \u2013 \u201cthe Jonestown tractor\u201d? Not one vehicle with people you knew that wasn\u2019t a threat and then a few minutes later, a vehicle with (unknown) <\/em>concealed assassins that was?! What was Mrs. Parks\u2019 \u201cBut here<\/em>\u2026\u201d? Another \u201csighting\u201d? Not that<\/em> tractor, the Jonestown tractor over by the side of the field \u2013 men were sticking right up visibly from that<\/em> vehicle \u2013 we knew those guys, we could recognize them. But no, this new sighting; the \u201chere,\u201d wasn\u2019t the same. \u201cHere\u201d was whatever vehicle concealed the gunmen whose were \u201chid.\u201c<\/p>\n But how could the driver<\/em> be concealed? \u201cReal\u201d tractors feature the driver sticking right up into the open. That\u2019s the first thing you see. And you don\u2019t say \u201chid\u201d if the driver is in plain sight!<\/p>\n What Mrs. Parks described as \u201chid\u201d would hardly qualify as eyewitness identification of assassins \u2013 to the contrary. Much less verify that the vehicle in which \u201cthe men were hid\u201d was the same Jonestown tractor. Yet given that the driver, at least, was very<\/em> visible in the real Jonestown tractor (as filmed just minutes prior to the attack! \u2013 <\/em>see picture 4 in \u201cThe Vehicle Used in the Attack,\u201d well as numerous photos in \u201cEyewitness Identifications?\u201d), identification of the vehicle itself, not just its occupants, comes into question.<\/p>\n There is even another confirmation of \u201chid.\u201d One eyewitness at least (in context, it appears to have been a newsman) told the FBI he saw three strangers from an unidentified vehicle \u201cwith canvas over the top\u201d <\/strong>inquiring who were the Peoples Temple people and on what plane were they departing?<\/p>\n But no one even asked a single follow-up question.<\/p>\n Instead, most eyewitnesses claimed that the tractor driver was Stanley Gieg, a fair-skinned, blond-haired young man. But the only gunman in front of<\/em> the long tractor-trailer (surely best candidate for \u201cthe driver\u201d) was a dark-skinned black man. Nor was he any of the accused black<\/em> men either. Not by sight, not by photographs, not by description by \u201ceyewitnesses\u201d themselves of those individuals!<\/p>\n In fact no one<\/em> matches. And that\u2019s no \u201cguess,\u201d either. The lead assassin, shown right there on film, was about seven feet tall and dressed head to toe in green-camouflage military khakis and\u2026\u2026.<\/strong> no one even noticed???<\/em><\/strong> But no one reviewed the NBC film. And no one showed it to survivors. And of course<\/em> that would have verified or discounted the \u201ceyewitness identifications.\u201d Namely, discounted<\/em> them.<\/p>\n Instead, there was no<\/strong> questioning. A U.S. Congressman was assassinated and they don\u2019t even question??<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n No trace of even minimal<\/em> cross-examination in the FBI report. Like, \u201cYou say such-and-such man was shooting. When did you first see and recognize that man?\u201d Then you find out they saw that person earlier<\/em> on a Temple vehicle. \u201cWell, how do you know this was the same man? Was he the same height, the same race, dressed the same way?\u201d And then you would get, well, I didn\u2019t exactly see their faces, it wasn\u2019t close up, I ducked down, or I fled, or he looked like a man I saw earlier<\/em>. \u201cAnd you didn\u2019t see that who you had earlier identified as a blond white-skinned driver was now suddenly a dark-skinned black man? And you completely missed a seven-foot giant dressed head to toe in green military camouflage?\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n Had the community survived and this were ever charged, it would never have gone to trial. Just take the FBI report as \u201cthe evidence,\u201d and you don\u2019t even pass a preliminary hearing. There is not a single eyewitness statement that would have survived any questions!<\/p>\n I wonder if Mrs. Parks was told that the Jonestown tractor she saw by the side of the airstrip with the driver at rest and in plain sight, was supposed to be the exact same tractor<\/em> that transported hidden assassins in a murderous rage (and in military dress, to boot!,) just what? A few minutes later?<\/p>\n Does that make a bit of sense? Of course not. But Mrs. Parks\u2019 comments were just \u201ctip of the iceberg,\u201d at that.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Could All Those Eyewitnesses Really Have Been Wrong?<\/p>\n Yes. But not just \u201ccould have been.\u201d Provably were<\/em>.<\/p>\n It\u2019s even worse. The eyewitnesses claimed they did <\/em>identify shooters, and the same names come up again and again. So that \u201cmakes their case,\u201d right? No, not at all. It damns<\/strong> their case. <\/em><\/p>\n So am I saying that no one saw anyone? Of course not. They saw a lot<\/em> of people! They saw them before<\/em>, they saw them after<\/em>. There is just not one single credible eyewitness identification during<\/em>. And there are reasons for that. No one ever laid out the logistics before now.<\/p>\n There were in fact unfavorable<\/em> logistics for eyewitness ID\u2019s, even for defectors (the newsmen could not identify anyone from Peoples Temple) as the film footage reveals. Namely, a bulk of the defectors were already on the plane and the others facing the plane about to board with their backs to the oncoming assassins. Then anyone left standing after the rapid, brutal burst of gunfire, fled in the other direction! Away from the real Jonestown tractor-tractor still parked on the edge of the airstrip and away from the fleeing assassins!<\/p>\n No one accurately eyewitnessed anyone except for NBC Bob Brown\u2019s camera. He filmed the killers who did it, not<\/strong> men seen prior to<\/em> (and\/or after<\/em>) the shootings. Moreover, as the film footage from NBC now confirms, the gunmen were indeed crouched down in hiding before they emerged on cue \u2013 that \u201ccue\u201d being a highly-sophisticated, perfectly-executed-and-timed diversionary maneuver. (See<\/em> \u201cLogistics: Military Execution.\u201d)<\/p>\n Thus no one even saw<\/em> them until they disembarked, with people then fleeing, not peering into the faces of their attackers! Moreover, the lead assassin was already shooting on his first step forward and being rifles, not handguns, the shooters\u2019 faces were blocked by the rifles\u2019 sights!<\/p>\n Everyone in the congressman\u2019s party fell to the ground or fled. Eyewitness identifications, anyone? I don\u2019t think so. Well, unless maybe you survived for the walk-through following the attack and were looking up while terrified, maybe hiding behind a wheel hoping not to be noticed.\u00a0 (Not too likely at that, as the planes wheels were shot out by the assassins.)<\/p>\n The only viable eyewitness was Bob Brown\u2019s camera, and Ron Javers, the newsman who was by his side, wrote Brown was \u201cincredibly tenacious,\u201d filming up until he himself was shot.<\/p>\n And that\u2019s what we saw on WPIX-NY November 17, 1979. Right up to Brown\u2019s camera lens. That\u2019s why Chris Kice could look at the screen and say of her husband, \u201cI don\u2019t see Tom. None of those men are Tom.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Eyewitness Identifications of the Vehicle Used in the Attack?<\/p>\n Nor was the vehicle that transported the assassinations identified. Not by anyone<\/em>. For the record:<\/p>\n Of the five newsmen on site who survived:<\/p>\n Steven Sung identified the wrong vehicle.<\/p>\n Ron Javers just said they opened fire with no mention of a vehicle.<\/p>\n Tim Reiterman correctly noted that \u201cthe tractor-trailer pulled up\u201d but then went on to add that it was the same tractor-trailer \u201cthat had been seen earlier at the mission,\u201d which it was not. Then again, the real tractor-trailer was indeed close by at the time, and who knows what Mr. Reiterman saw? He never said he saw the vehicle driving to the staging point.<\/em> No one did<\/em>.<\/p>\n Bob Flick neither identified any shooter nor the vehicle they disembarked from, but seemed to clairvoyantly surmise that those stone-silent men had to be \u201cAmerican\u201d: \u201cThey were all Americans, white Americans, black Americans\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n Charles Krause of the Washington Post<\/em> of the approaching gunmen: \u201cI didn\u2019t bother to look.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s 0 for 5 from trained newsmen. And should they have been more observant while being variously shot at, wounded and\/or fleeing for their lives? Likely not. But then we are also left with the reality that there were no eyewitness identifications<\/strong>. Not of the gunmen, not of the vehicle, either one.<\/strong><\/p>\n The Land of Mismatches<\/strong><\/p>\n I didn\u2019t create the pandemonium of that scene, but I will finally straighten it out:<\/p>\n There were two vehicles. There were two sets of shooters and\/or wannabe shooters. There were no viable eyewitnesses, except for government eyewitness Jim Cobb, who by his own account was \u201con the opposite side of the plane\u201d and then fled into the bush.<\/p>\n There were two locales, and when the men on the truck<\/em> (or the tractor-trailer, or both, this is unclear) returned to Jonestown (locale #1) to \u201cclaim credit for\u201d the killings (a la \u201cWe did it!\u201c) there was no film footage of the tractor-trailer<\/em> at Port Kaituma (locale #2) to confirm that they could not have done it<\/em>.<\/p>\n Everything that could be mismatched, was.<\/p>\n Yet we do know one thing \u2013 that people cannot be two places at the same time, nor on two vehicles at the same time, especially if the vehicles are different to a provable certainty (as we will establish here). The vehicle from which the real assassins disembarked, which is now on publicly-released film, was not<\/strong> a Jonestown vehicle, which shall be proven.<\/p>\n Therefore, wherever people were at the time, whatever they intended, whatever they saw, whatever they reported, even whatever they claimed credit for\u2026.. There was only one<\/strong> set of shooters who killed the congressman and it is impossible<\/strong> that they were from Peoples Temple.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Vehicle Mismatch Ignored from 1978 Until Now<\/p>\n Let\u2019s start with the account of Steven Sung, a reporter on site who was shot, as a paradigm for how non-critically this has been handled from that day until now:<\/p>\n This will make it shockingly obvious that no one has ever even attempted<\/em> to investigate the assassination.<\/p>\n When Stanley Nelson interviewed Steven Sung in his recent film, Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple<\/em>, he provided Mr. Sung with a child\u2019s toy airplane and a toy truck. Mr. Sung specifically talked about \u201ca six wheel drive dump truck.\u201d That vehicle, all six sets of wheels visible was filmed at the airstrip just the day before. It was a huge vehicle unmistakably different than the tractor-trailer, the type vehicle used in the attack.<\/p>\n In Nelson\u2019s film, Mr. Sung proceeded to manipulate these child\u2019s toys into a circle to demonstrate that the Temple dump truck had circled around the plane with Temple men on it. Then he said, while scooping his hand into the back of the toy as if to reveal a secret discovery, \u201cBut we didn\u2019t realize that there were gunmen hidden in the back of the truck.\u201d<\/p>\n And why was he sure that there were \u201cgunmen in the back of the truck\u201d? Simple. Why, shooting then broke out! And did he see the shooters? Well, apparently not. He just assumed<\/em> that the shooting came from Temple men who had been in the truck. Case closed.<\/p>\n We cannot fault Mr. Sung. He was wounded and in the panic did not see that the shooters had emerged from a tractor-trailer, not the truck at all. But what of the film director? All of three seconds later,<\/strong> Mr. Nelson unveiled the actual NBC film footage of the time showing the gunmen disembarking from not a truck at all, but a tractor-trailer<\/em>!! <\/strong>(Well, apparently. Not even a real \u201ctractor,\u201d at that.)<\/p>\n Are people visually challenged? A film director doesn\u2019t notice the obvious himself, unthinkingly demolishes a story he just had told all of three seconds earlier<\/em>, then puts it in a nationally-released film seen by thousands of people in theatres, as well as TV and onto DVD.<\/p>\n And not just Mr. Nelson, but no one anywhere spots the difference?!<\/p>\n Now it is right there IN PLAIN SIGHT<\/strong> and still<\/em> no one looks?<\/p>\n And what about then? These were supposed to be Temple shooters, yet all the Temple men \u201ceyewitness-identified\u201d were from either the Temple tractor-trailer or the Temple truck seen earlier, not from the vehicle which launched the attack<\/em>.<\/p>\n Indeed, there was not just one vehicle mismatch at issue, namely between the truck and the tractor-trailer. There were two, given that upon closer examination, the vehicle used in the attack did not even come from Jonestown<\/strong>.<\/p>\n How can we be sure of that? Now we get to the next factor which is dispositive<\/em>.<\/p>\n The Tractor-Trailer Used in the Attack<\/strong><\/p>\n Note from the attached NBC film footage, that the deadly attack was launched from a tractor-trailer which shows up in clear detail. Still photos have been extracted from that footage \u2013 such as picture 5 <\/em>in \u201cThe Vehicle Used in the Attack.\u201d<\/p>\n I then researched what make and model tractors were at Jonestown. Understand, such equipment was imported for long-time use. This was a remote jungle with items like tractors procured at great effort and expense. You didn\u2019t casually switch out equipment like turning in a used car.<\/p>\n The search narrowed itself down. First I discovered a picture of a tractor at Jonestown from an old PR brochure, as reprinted here (picture 2<\/em> in \u201cThe Vehicle Used in the Attack.\u201d) I was then told that the main tractor at Jonestown was a Massey Ferguson 178. Indeed, googling that make and model showed up a match to the picture in the brochure (picture 1<\/em>). Note \u201c178\u201d and \u201cMassey Ferguson\u201d clearly marked.<\/p>\n But was that the tractor used to transport people, luggage, equipment back and forth between the community and the airstrip? More pointedly, was it the vehicle used to do so for the congressman\u2019s party that day?<\/p>\n I scoured the additional NBC footage to see if it was indeed the Massey Ferguson 178 tractor ferrying back and forth between the airstrip and the community. This film was more degraded than the footage commonly shown, perhaps considered \u201cunimportant\u201d (just a vehicle shuttling to the airstrip?), thus poorly preserved. Nevertheless, this resulted in a positive match (picture 3 <\/em>in \u201cThe Vehicle Used in the Attack\u201d and\/or page 1 of \u201cEyewitness Identifications?\u201d). You\u2019ll note the following:<\/p>\n That\u2019s what Massey Ferguson tractors of that day looked like.<\/p>\n Picture 4<\/em> shows the exact same Massey Ferguson 178 tractor from Jonestown filmed mere minutes before the congressman\u2019s would-be departure. It is visibly, identifiably the same tractor as filmed in picture 3.<\/em><\/p>\n Last, which is the shocker, was identification of the vehicle used in the attack (picture 5<\/em>). Would it be the same Massey Ferguson 178? A different tractor? If so, a tractor that also existed at Jonestown? A reporter on site said that the tractor had come back. So was that the same tractor that \u201ccame back\u201d or a different one?<\/p>\n The result of retrieving that tractor from the assassination film footage is both shocking and dispositive. The vehicle bringing the assassins looks<\/em> much like the Massey Ferguson 178 at first glance. In fact, if you were just to look at the front end, like you see the vehicle driving towards you, you\u2019d think, o.k., it\u2019s back again, the same vehicle. You\u2019d be fooled.<\/p>\n You\u2019d see the protruding headlights, the characteristic front grid, the open engine on the side and the large metal backwards \u201cL\u201d just in front of the front wheel. \u201cSame vehicle,\u201d you would think.<\/p>\n A closer look reveals that it was not the same vehicle at all.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Why This Is Grade A Proof<\/p>\n We already have enough \u201cGrade A proof\u201d to discredit that the 417-page FBI on eyewitness identifications. But even more evidence supports the impossibility that the assassins were from Peoples Temple.<\/p>\n Namely, the tractor used in the attack against Congressman Leo Ryan was not only not<\/strong> a Jonestown tractor, but was not a tractor known anywhere<\/em>. You can look in any tractor catalog from then, now, any time, and you will not find such a vehicle.<\/p>\n It was a \u201cdesigner tractor\u201d so to speak. One of a kind. Custom-modified, undoubtedly at some expense and for specific purpose, but not available that way from any manufacturer.<\/p>\n Why would that be? Simple. A tractor is an open vehicle. Every tractor has an open inset, a cutaway where the driver steps in. That shows up clearly in the first four pictures of the Massey Ferguson 178: (1) from the internet; (2) from an old PR brochure about the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project; (3) from the Port Kaituma airstrip when the congressman\u2019s party arrived; and 4) filmed at the airstrip just prior to the attack.<\/p>\n Three of the pictures (2, 3 &4 <\/em>in \u201cThe Vehicle Used in the Attack\u201d), those taken on site at Jonestown and Port Kaituma respectively, feature a driver seated in the tractor. You can see his entire body down to his feet touching the floorboard. All tractors are like that.<\/p>\n Well, except for the tractor used in the attack (picture 5.<\/em>). That had no driver\u2019s inset at all<\/strong>. Just solid red metal from the front of the vehicle to the back. No inset, no cutaway, no opening, just solid bright red metal covering where the inset should have been<\/em>, then moving right into the fender over the back tire.<\/p>\n Now, if it were simply some other vehicle used as transport back and forth to the airstrip, we might say ok., so \u201cthe killers from Jonestown\u201d used a different vehicle for the attack than had been at the airstrip previously. But no. This is a \u201ctractor\u201d that should have existed nowhere!!<\/p>\n Incidentally, lest anyone query if maybe the driver\u2019s inset was blocked by the angle at which it was filmed:\u00a0 The vehicle was filmed in direct sunlight, broadside and at rest.\u00a0 Optimal.<\/p>\n Also note that the front and back right<\/em> wheels are peeking forwards from the front and back left<\/em> wheels. This marks the tractor as facing slightly forwards, marking the area where the driver\u2019s inset should be more<\/em> visible, not less.<\/p>\n (For comparison, note that in picture 3<\/em>, the tractor is already into a left hand turn and the driver\u2019s inset is way visible.)<\/p>\n Next note the unbroken sweep of metal in front of<\/em> the back wheel of the tractor. The back fender is open to the camera, but instead of being sliced off like a piece of cake as on the real Jonestown tractor, it moves forward with no breaks.<\/p>\n Next note the absence of a visible steering wheel on this vehicle. In pictures 1, 2 and 3,<\/em> the steering wheel is elevated and visible. In picture 5<\/em>, there is no steering wheel visible nor the elevated red metal that would be sticking through the steering wheel as is clear in pictures 1 & 2.<\/p>\n Instead the contour slants down<\/em>. How we can be sure, even with this degraded film, is that the background is green vegetation and the downwards slant is clearly bordered by green (vegetation,) not red (metal).<\/p>\n Again note: Picture 1<\/em>, steering wheel visible; picture 2<\/em>, steering wheel visible; picture 3,<\/em> steering wheel visible; picture 5<\/em>, no steering wheel.<\/p>\n Next note the floorboard:\u00a0 In pictures 1, 2 & 3,<\/em> the floorboard is a single fairly thin piece of metal with only space beneath it down to the ground. In picture 5<\/em>, however, the bottom section of the tractor extends thickly from the front wheel to the back with no thinning or differentiation. The contours are neither single nor flat, but look like an open scissors. It\u2019s a different construction.<\/em><\/p>\n Obviously, the combination of no driver\u2019s inset, no steering wheel and no open floorboard suggests that the driver<\/em> did not want to be seen!<\/em> We wonder why.<\/p>\n Was this just some \u201cfunny-looking\u201d tractor from a \u201cscrewy\u201d federal agency that just happened to hate Congressman Leo Ryan? That will be addressed shortly. For now, we can establish a new baseline for any future queries: That it was NOT<\/strong> Peoples Temple who assassinated the congressman. It could not have been. If it was not our vehicle, it was not our men and not our assassination. <\/strong><\/p>\n We have already established in \u201cEyewitness Identifications?\u201d that the assassins were not from Peoples Temple anyway. This is reinforced by wrong vehicle identification as well. Moreover, since this \u201ctractor\u201d should have been no one\u2019s<\/em> vehicle (i.e., not a tractor of any known manufacture), then any possibility of \u201cmistaken identity?\u201d gets scratched as well. It\u2019s not like they were driving a Cadillac instead of a Chevy and maybe Jonestown had a Cadillac too. This \u201ctractor\u201d was not even a farm vehicle \u2013 it was custom-designed for military<\/em> use.<\/p>\n Since this vehicle was partly (namely, the front end) a \u201clook-alike\u201d tractor, the Massey Ferguson 178, to deceive the onlooker into a false snap \u201cidentification\u201c; and partly (namely, the back end) its frame rebuilt for some<\/em> suspect reason (i.e., modified for an assassination, not a new way to plough corn!); then we must consider an intended frame. Namely, the framing of Peoples Temple for the assassination of Congressman Leo Ryan. <\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n A Damning Document Clinches the Prime Suspect<\/p>\n With frame-ups, we not only want to prove who didn\u2019t<\/em> do it, but who did<\/em>. Take the most famous of disputed assassinations \u2013 that of John F. Kennedy. Whether Lee Harvey Oswald was \u201ca lone gunman\u201d at all, we still could never confirm whether the planners, much less the assassins were Russian, Cuban, the Mafia, Naval Intelligence, the CIA\u2026..<\/p>\n We have no such multiple-choice dilemma with the assassination of Leo Ryan. The alternate culprit is clear: the CIA. We already alluded to a U.S. government log showing CIA presence in Jonestown in the middle of that very night, reprinted here. We are also about to detail the known enmities between Leo Ryan and the CIA, and Peoples Temple and the CIA both<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n