{"id":86858,"date":"2019-03-24T11:24:10","date_gmt":"2019-03-24T18:24:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=86858"},"modified":"2026-04-22T15:16:29","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T22:16:29","slug":"serial-409","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=86858","title":{"rendered":"Serial 409"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>[<strong>Editor\u2019s note<\/strong>: This document was released both as a <u><a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=96304\"> State Department cable<\/a><\/u> as part of its 1981 FOIA release, and as <u><a href=\"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=86858\">Serial 409<\/a><\/u> of the FBI\u2019s RYMUR release. <\/p>\n<p>[The text for this document was released in 2014 by <a href=\"https:\/\/wikileaks.org\/plusd\/cables\/1978GEORGE03952_d.html\">Wikileaks<\/a>. It is also available through the <a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20260414171637\/https:\/\/wikileaks.org\/plusd\/cables\/1978GEORGE03952_d.html\">Internet Archive<\/a>.]<\/em><\/p>\n<p>LIMITED OFFICIAL USE<br \/>\nPAGE 01<br \/>\nGEORGE 03952 262218Z<br \/>\nACTION ARA-15<br \/>\nINFO OCT-01 ISO-00 SCS-06 CA-01 L-03 H-01 FBIE-00 JUSE-00 SY-05 USSS-00 CIAE-00 DODE-00 INR-10 NSAE-00 PA-01 SP-02 NSCE-00 SSO-00 ICAE-00 INRE-00 \/045 W<br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;090609 262223Z \/73<\/p>\n<p>O 262140Z NOV 78<br \/>\nFM AMEMBASSY GEORGETOWN<br \/>\nTO SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 8222<br \/>\nLIMITED OFFICIAL USE GEORGETOWN 3952<br \/>\nE.O. 11652: N\/A<br \/>\nTAGS: CASC OREP (RYAN, LEO) GY<br \/>\nSUBJECT: PRESS INQUIRIES ON PEOPLES TEMPLE<br \/>\nREF: STATE 299148<\/p>\n<p>1. Ambassador [John] Burke never met Reverend Jim Jones either officially or socially. As far as is known, Jones was never in Georgetown during the period since ambassador&#8217;s arrival in September 1977. As indicated in para one reftel, Mrs. [Marceline] Jones paid a courtesy call on ambassador at 3 pm Monday, June 26. This was their only meeting.<\/p>\n<p>2. Embassy has no record of ever having received the Blakey affidavit of June 15, 1978 from the department. Embassy did, however, receive a copy of the affidavit directly from one of the &#8220;Concerned Relatives&#8221; group in a communication postmarked August 11. Same individual is also know to have addressed a letter to Prime Minister [Forbes Burnham] regarding conditions in Jonestown. The affidavit was not discussed with the GOG [Government of Guyana].<\/p>\n<p>Burke [John Burke, U.S. Ambassador to Guyana]<\/p>\n<p>LIMITED OFFICIAL USE<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[Editor\u2019s note: This document was released both as a State Department cable as part of its 1981 FOIA release, and as Serial 409 of the FBI\u2019s RYMUR release. [The text for this document was released in 2014 by Wikileaks. It is also available through the Internet Archive.] LIMITED OFFICIAL USE PAGE 01 GEORGE 03952 262218Z [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":86799,"menu_order":25,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-86858","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/86858","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\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=86858"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/86858\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136997,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/86858\/revisions\/136997"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/86799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=86858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}