All language subtitles for Jonestown.Terror.In.The.Jungle.S01E01.WEB.x264-TORRENTGALAXY-eng

GUYANA NOVEMBER 18, 1978

Good evening.
Here's what's happening.

We're interrupting our special
broadcasting

to bring you
this special report.

Yesterday afternoon,
five Americans were shot down

by other Americans
on the airstrip

at Port Kaituma, Guyana.

One of the dead, Representative
Leo Ryan of California.

They'd gone to investigate a
cult called the Peoples Temple,

headed by a man known as
the Reverend Jim Jones,

and they were killed
by members of that cult.

8Appalling as that was,

it did not prepare us
for what was to follow.

What you're about to see
almost defies description,

and some of you
may not want to watch it.

Nine hundred ten died
in the poison ritual

of the Peoples Temple.

The word on everybody's lips
was shades of Auschwitz.

They found tremendous quantities
of potassium cyanide poison

mixed with Kool-Aid.

The bodies seemed awful
and orderly,

not flung about like corpses
after a battle, but neat,

hand in hand sometimes,

arms about each
other's shoulders.

Jones' victims were our
brothers and sisters.

What was it that caused them

to leave their Christian
churches and join Jones?

Why in the world would so many
people agree to kill themselves?

You have never met a man
like Jim Jones before.

I am here!

The spirit of Christ
to set you free!

To deliver you
from your captivity.

Jim was really captivating.

He had this way of really
reaching into your emotions.

The community that he had
developed in Peoples Temple was

what I'd been looking for
all along.

It was full of life.

It was a message of equality
for all people.

You're going
all over the country,

taking the message of God

and carrying it out
to the masses.

I am creator of the
Peoples Temple mission

and I will have my way,

or I will tear hell
out of everything you've built!

The more power he got,
the darker the story got.

What my father was doing

was building a little kingdom
for himself.

Your whole life, it was all
based around the church.

There was a consequence
to any infraction.

You punk!
You damn gangland punk!

We were gonna be hunted down
and killed if we ever left.

There is something seriously
wrong here.

You cannot stamp me out,
I'm here to stay!

The leader has lost his mind.

People are being held here
against their will.

You bring those kids back here!

This dark side...

Let's just be done with it.

Let's be done
with the agony of it.

...will expand and expand...

Hurry, my children, hurry.

...until finally it explodes
in the Guyanese jungle.

If we can't live in peace,
then let's die in peace.

The survivors of the
Jonestown suicide murders

were met by friends, relatives,

and a handful of Peoples Temple
members from San Francisco.

Oh, no!

One of the biggest mysteries
in the Jonestown story is,

what kind of a leader
could order mass suicide

and be obeyed?

Who was Jim Jones that grown-ups
would kill themselves

and their children for him?

I think there's an opinion that

these people that
went down there were off,

they were a little crazy,
they... they weren't like us...

VERNON GOSNEY
JONESTOWN SURVIVOR

...when all they were were
people who wanted a better life

and thought that
they were gonna get it

and worked damn hard to get it.

VERNON GOSNEY
JOINED PEOPLES TEMPLE IN 1972

Before joining the Peoples
Temple, I was a teenager.

Just kind of a little lost soul
floating around.

I was in an interracial
relationship.

My first wife was
African American.

Our relationship was not
embraced by family,

either hers or mine.

Sheryl and I were kind of
out in the world by ourself.

We had no support system
whatsoever

and felt very isolated
in the world,

and when we walked into that
temple, it was full of...life.

SAN FRANCISCO 1972

SIX YEARS BEFORE MASSACRE

Everyone was singing.

It was very alive,
it was very up,

and, you know,
people dancing in the spirit.

We were embraced
as an interracial couple,

and there was a message
of inclusivity.

There was a message of equality
for all people.

People were passionate,
people were engaged.

They were talking about that

there was this injustice
in the world

and, you know, discrimination,
and so that moved me.

LESLIE WAGNER-WILSON
JOINED PEOPLES TEMPLE IN 1969

I ended up in Peoples Temple

because my sister got involved
in heavy drugs,

and my mother
just not knowing where to turn.

So a friend of hers told her,

there's this church that has
a drug rehab program for youth.

I felt like I was a part of
this incredible community

that put self aside because
there was a greater good,

and the greater good was to
ensure that

babies didn't go to bed hungry,

that there was equality
for everyone.

I liked that.
I liked the thought

that I could actually
make a difference.

The first time I went
to a Peoples Temple meeting,

as soon as I walked in the door,
I felt like I was home.

TIM CARTER
JOINED PEOPLES TEMPLE IN 1972

In the summer of '66,
I volunteered to go to Vietnam.

I was 19 years old and it really
messed with my head.

When I was discharged
from the Marine Corps,

I didn't really know
what to do with myself.

I was searching spiritually.

The Peoples Temple was
a perfect kind of synthesis

of what I was feeling
at the time,

spiritually and politically.

And I still hadn't even
met Jim Jones yet.

There is, in fact,
somebody to respond

any time there is a need...

the man who is, in fact,
the Peoples Temple.

Let me present to you,
Reverend Jim Jones.

This administration
is for no other purpose...

That's right!

...than to show mankind
the road to freedom.

Amen!

I am here as a sample
and example to show you that

you can bring yourself up
with your own bootstraps...

-Yes!
-...and you can become your God.

We shall have our freedom
here and now!

Jim was really captivating.

As a child, I just thought, wow,

here's a man who has this
speaking ability

that is dynamic.

Think of Martin Luther King at
his best, in terms of oratory,

you know,
and that's who Jones was.

From the lowest
of economic positions,

from the misery of poverty
near the railroad tracks,

I came to show you that the
only God you need is within you.

He had this way of really
reaching your emotions.

He would address each,

kind of, grouping within
Peoples Temple

to get us engaged.

If you wanted him
to be a minister,

he would talk about the Bible.

If you wanted him
to be political,

he was absolutely
gonna include that.

Edie...

Fingers, are your fingers numb?

In your right hand.

And you're having
enormous headaches in your head.

Yes.

Reach your hands out.

Reach your hands out to me.

And then there was this other
aspect that we had never seen,

and that was the healings.

Reach the fingers out
that are bothering you.

Now, is the pain gone?

-It's gone.
-It's real.

The idea that someone could call
someone out of the audience,

know about them,

and then heal them of some
ailment, that was amazing.

I've never seen anything
like that.

During the course of my time
at the Peoples Temple,

I witnessed many, many,
many healings.

Come forth, my dear.

Stand up. Take that step.

Take that step. Move forward.
Move forward.

Walk briskly. Walk, walk.

Even though I'm a skeptic,
I had to be convinced

because what's real is real,
what I could see, I could see.

He said, "In the name of Christ,
you're healed!"

And my pain was gone.

And now, a year and a half
later, it's still gone,

and I praise God for that.

I'd been waiting all this time
since Vietnam

to contribute my energies
to something that I felt

was actually doing good.

I jumped in with both feet.

The one thing that I never
thought, never even dreamed of,

is that our biggest enemy
was the leader.

Now, will each of you give
a very fond embrace,

a salutary kiss,
a greeting to your neighbor.

Let's fill this atmosphere
with warmth and love.

It wasn't just Jim Jones
standing there.

It was really the ambiance
that he created around him.

His wife, Marceline, sitting on
stage, seemingly, you know,

mesmerized
by what he was saying.

And he'd always talked about
himself as a family man.

Jim had adopted kids
of all different races

so, you know, I was pretty sold
that he was a good dad

and a good leader.

When the Jones' decided
to adopt,

they came up with the concept
of the rainbow family.

Let's try to vary our family so
we will be the living embodiment

of how people of all races come
together and belong together.

As the story goes, my family
went in to adopt a baby girl,

and I guess, from what my mother
used to tell me,

I started crying.

My mother went over
to pick me up.

My father came over and saw this
black baby in his wife's arms.

They looked at the social worker
at the orphanage and said,

"Why can't we adopt
this child instead?"

And they kind of went,
"No, no, no, no, no.

That's a... That's an
African-American child."

And my father took
this political stance,

"No, I will adopt any child
that we want."

So, I probably should say
I never liked the title,

"the Rainbow Family."

We were a mixed bag, for sure,
especially for that time.

Now, in many respects,
that's lovely,

regardless of the motivation,

but what I felt was that much of
what was created as a family

was done for show.

It's hard to know
if Dad really believed anything

or what he believed, if he did.

My father was starved for
attention from a very early age,

and that never let up.

If anything, it intensified.

LYNN, INDIANA

1931

There's a little town
in Indiana.

The moment I think of it,
a great deal of pain comes.

Jim Jones is born
and he's raised in rural Indiana

where, back then,

one of the main purposes in life
is to fit in,

to be like everybody else.

And from the time Jim Jones
is born, that doesn't happen.

Part of the problem
are his parents.

His father was destroyed
by World War I.

My Grandma Jones,
she wasn't around a lot.

So, my father wasn't being
nurtured in a way

that I feel a child
is best nurtured,

and I think
he compensated for that.

And so he sought the approval
of others in a variety of ways.

In a small town like Lynn,

Jim was a little
on the weird side.

Jim had this flair
for the dramatic

and I think
he enjoyed being dramatic.

He would recruit the other kids
to come to elaborate funerals

he's holding for roadkill.

I don't know whether it was
just for its own sake

or whether it was
to freak people out.

All the boys in Lynn,
during World War II,

started playing war games.

And they all wanted to be
Allied soldiers.

Except one.

Jim Jones was mesmerized
by the way Hitler...

...could have a whole audience
enraptured,

stand up and perform,

and order people to do things,
and they would do it.

He was eccentric, and that could
be off-putting to some children.

He was very controlling
in his nature.

He did spend a fair amount
of time on his own.

He was left to his own devices,

so where could he find
this community?

I think, with my father,

church was where he could find
solace, find peace.

The other boys want to play
baseball, ride their bikes.

Jim joins five different
churches.

And as a child, he saw
that in those church services,

there was one guy,
the guy that was talking,

that got all the attention.

My father was picking up

different components
of each religion.

But I do think you ought to
stand for the glory of God

if you're that dad-gum smart.

Baptist preacher who would,
you know, slam the Bible down.

The Pentecostal person
talking in tongues, you know,

skipping up and down the aisle.

Jim is not just watching
the people rolling on the floor.

He's paying attention
to these preachers.

What did they say?

How do they get people built up
to this point?

How does this minister
keep an audience enthralled?

It was a given.

Of course,
he's gonna be a minister.

What else is this weird boy
gonna be?

AT AGE 25, JIM JONES FORMS HIS
FIRST CHURCH IN INDIANAPOLIS.

THE PEOPLES TEMPLE IS THE FIRST
INTEGRATED CHURCH IN INDIANA.

His mother instilled in him this
concern for the "downtrodden",

the have-nots, and I think that
he genuinely felt it was wrong

that people be judged
by the color of their skin

or their background
or what they come from.

His message resonated more
with African Americans.

They were so tired
of the Jim Crow laws.

I'm going to tell
you one thing, darlin'.

You and me are the same.

To the white man,
we're the same!

They don't think any more of us!

They don't want
any more to do with us!

Jones, in the black community
in Indianapolis, becomes a hero.

But you could only go so far
in Indianapolis.

He was not gonna be
just a small town guy.

He wanted to be more
universally known.

He was not somebody committed
to the word of God or the Bible.

He wanted notoriety.
He wanted power.

Where's the power?
That's where I want to go.

California. That's the place.

That's where you can
make things happen.

But he had to bring as many
of his followers as he could.

What's he gonna tell them
the reason they have to go?

We have to be prepared
to take our flight

in the case of Armageddon

that would spring forth
in a nuclear hell.

Jones starts prophesizing,
there's gonna be nuclear war.

Everyone living here
is going to die.

It's his excuse to get the hell
out of Indiana, and it works.

JULY 1965

In terms of a darker side
that would ultimately end up

being the tragedy at Jonestown,

I think that that started,
actually, in California.

Regardless of what good works
the temple was involved in,

what my father was doing
was building

a little kingdom for himself.

I am creator of the
Peoples Temple mission

and I will have my way,

or I will tear the hell out
of everything you've built!

IN 1965, JIM JONES
AND 140 CHURCH MEMBERS

MOVE TO REDWOOD VALLEY, CA.

We got to Redwood Valley.

We had some resources and people
moved into the different homes.

And Jim had bought this home

with this big grape field
in front of it.

And shortly after, Jim had the
resources to build a church.

When they relocated
to Redwood Valley,

a new group of people were attracted
to the preaching of Jim Jones,

and this was this
white, educated elite.

The membership of Peoples Temple
at that point tripled.

My life changed when I moved up
to Redwood Valley.

It was really kind of nice,
having been raised in the city.

We were very busy
with church activities and duties,

and when you went to sleep, you kind
of felt like you helped people

and accomplished something.

But there was something
that wasn't right.

I shall do all the miracles that you
said your God would do and never did.

-Yes!
-I shall come

and heal you of all the diseases that
you prayed for, that never happened.

Amen!

I think Jim was a power addict
early on.

He was always watchful,
trying to think

how he could control
Peoples Temple members.

When Peoples Temple has grown
big enough,

Jones can start teaching the real
purpose of Peoples Temple.

The only thing that brings perfect
justice, freedom, and equality,

perfect love in all of its beauty
and holiness,

is socialism, socialism, socialism.

Socialism is God.

We were being introduced
to socialism.

Socialism meant that everybody
would have the same.

There would be no starvation,

there would be no one going
without any clothes.

All the basic needs that a human
being is supposed to have,

they would have under socialism.

He starts encouraging
communal living.

And let's say in a house that
might have been designed

for 6 people to live,
he'll put 12, 15, or even 20,

and they'll sleep on mattresses
on the floor.

That was so strange to me,
but it felt good to sacrifice

because the sacrifice
was for the greater good.

No one realized
that Jim was using socialism

to bring people in
and control people.

This is a church that you're either
all the way in or all the way out,

there's no in between.

And this church expected you
to give up everything.

He didn't want people
having sex, you know,

'cause you were supposed to use
your sexual energy for the cause.

We were always asked to
further our commitment.

Are you willing to give up
your little, petty desires

and creature comforts,
or are you just full of hot air?

I don't own a car,
I don't own any new furniture,

I never buy any new clothes,

I have never bought
a new pair of shoes in my life,

and that's why I am free!

You're not free! You're a slave!

You're doing just exactly what
"the man" wants you to do.

Everything went to
Peoples Temple.

All the things that my mother had:

Antiques, china,
and this beautiful home in Ukiah.

My mother gave her house up
for Jim Jones.

The whole idea of going communal

is that you start to cut down
on the outside influence.

Everybody is working
as much as possible.

Jones said to one of his followers,
the key is,

keep 'em poor, keep 'em tired,
and they'll never leave.

Jones' spiel was that
family relationships

are the sickest relationships of all.

So, the families were separated.

I cared for four children, myself,
that were not mine.

They were someone
else's children.

Now Jones wants his followers
to refer to him and Marceline

as father and mother.

Marceline loved the idea they were
a team, they were working together.

He pretended he was a family man,

but, you know,
really that was all a façade.

That was all the public persona.

Nothing is as it appears.

Most people had no idea
Jim was not being faithful.

He found another
long-term companion.

Her name was Carolyn Layton,

and Carolyn was absolutely
enraptured of Jim Jones.

The things he was saying
and doing mirrored her beliefs.

As a young child, I think
I first started noticing

when Jim would leave at night
and come home in the morning.

His not being faithful...

...it was just wrong.

I was mortified, horrified by it.

That's when my esteem for him
gradually fell apart.

Eventually, I remember my mother
wanting a divorce.

She wanted the kids.

And Jim said, you will die before
you take my kids away from me.

This dark side that appears really
for the first time in Ukiah...

will expand and expand until finally
it explodes in the Guyanese jungle.

I will fight! I will fight!
I will fight! I will fight!

Peoples Temple population
starts to grow,

and as it grows,
so does Jones' need for money.

Jim was looking for more membership,

so, in about 1972, we started
bus trips around the country.

Peoples Temple buys a fleet
of Greyhound buses.

Jim Jones is gonna go
to the big cities

and he is going to attract
huge crowds, get a lot of money,

and then he'll come back,
he can use that in Ukiah.

We would pass out leaflets,
speak to people,

try to get 'em to the service

and tout the wonders of Jim Jones
and Peoples Temple.

As a teenager,
what better life could you have?

You're hanging out
with all your friends,

you're going all over the country
and taking the message of God

and carrying it out to the masses.

Along the way,
people always joined.

A couple buses aren't filled.

That's so as people want to join,

they can just get on the bus
and go with him.

And as his following grows,

they find peripheral ways
to make money.

They start selling pictures
that Jones has blessed.

This picture here
would sell for $5.

This is another picture
that he had for protection.

And if you don't have money
for the pictures,

give us your name and address
and Reverend Jones will bless a penny

and you'll be in his prayers.

They market all kinds of things.

Money comes pouring in.

Don't need to worry
if they throw you out of church.

I'll get you on that Greyhound bus
even if you don't have a penny.

And I'll give you the finest room
you ever saw.

Just get on my bus, and I'll take you
onto the Promised Land!

Heavenly spirit! God!

The man is a master entertainer.

Everything is planned
to the minute.

And then come the healings.

Sister Ingram,
you're concerned about the losing...

...the losing of your sight.

Take your glasses off.

You concentrate hard.

How many fingers?

Three.

You've been feeling pain
here in the chest?

-Yes.
-Look at my face.

Where's your pain?

Don't feel it, Jim!

Everybody is out of their minds
with excitement,

and Jones has never
been more dramatic.

PEOPLES TEMPLE

One time, a person broke their leg,

so they were tooken to the hospital
and put a cast on.

The next service,
their name was called

and asked
if they wanted to walk again.

Hear this?

You'll see her walk on this leg
like nothing was ever wrong.

The cast was cut off right
in front of everybody.

Your leg was broken yesterday?
Now run!

You're seeing this woman
who's all of a sudden

running through the church,
and everyone's just excited and,

"Father's healed her!"

And then a big thing at the time
was removal of cancers.

You have a cancer! I can tell!
Come forward! I'm gonna heal you.

This Christian, when she was
in the church of God and Christ,

no one could heal her.

Five times operated for cancer,
the doctors sewed her up to die.

But I... I said one day a year ago,
your time has come,

and she spit up the cancer.

You're healed.

People were jumping and happy
and I thought,

"Oh, my gosh,
she's healed of cancer."

I'm excited, the whole church
is just in a frenzy.

As time wore on, I started
questioning the healings.

I should have known
that it was a lie.

And people died because of that.

As time wore on, I started
questioning the healings.

There was a rumor that there was
something nefarious going on.

The healing with the woman that
they cut the cast off

and she's running around...

...they drugged her, and they put the
cast on her while she was asleep.

So when she woke up,
they told her that she had fallen.

They said, oh, you broke your leg.

She had no recollection
of it at all.

Her leg was never broken.

The fake healings were a way
to attract people falsely.

Even though they were great tools
to get people to believe,

they were nefarious.

I personally know
someone's grandmother,

who Jim apparently healed of cancer.

And then when cancer came back,
guess what she said?

"It must be because
I don't believe enough."

She wasn't gonna get treatment.

She was just gonna pray harder
and have more faith in Jim.

Well, she died of cancer.

And that's just one of, I'm sure,
hundreds of stories.

I BELIEVE IN JIM JONES

This was one of those areas where
that should have been a red flag

that I just ignored.

I'm not saying it's right,

but I believed the temple
was an opportunity

to create something
that was truly great.

And that's why I stayed
as long as I did.

The temple was set up
so no one could join the church

without first being checked out
thoroughly by Jones.

Everything required him
to be involved.

And the pressure got to him.

And Jones became
an abuser of drugs.

Jim Jones shared
with the congregation

that he had to take something to
keep him up because he worked 24/7,

24 hours a day
for the cause of socialism.

He needed amphetamines
to get up and keep going.

His schedule would last from early in
the morning until 2:00 or 3:00 a.m.

So he was sleeping maybe three
or four hours a night.

And then, when he could rest,

he had to take tranquilizers
to come down.

And I must say,
it is a great effort to be God.

I wish it upon another, but no one
else has the faculty that I do.

In the meantime, I shall be God and
beside me there shall be no other.

-Yes!
-Yeah!

I had no idea that Jim was on drugs.

No idea at all.

Later, I would discover
the sunglasses was because

he was hiding the way
his eyes looked.

Everybody remembers that Jim
Jones always wore dark glasses.

It was one of his signature
appearance things.

And he told everyone it was because

the spirit of the Lord
was so powerful in him,

if you looked directly in his eyes,
you might be burned on the spot.

But the real reason he did

was his eyes were so red and watery
and swollen from the drug use.

As he was taking more
and more drugs, you know,

his personality changed.

Behind the scenes, Jim's narcissism
was just uncontained.

And he was surrounded
by mistresses.

The women that Jones
was having sex with

almost all considered it an honor
to do this for father.

He portrayed himself as a martyr,
that he would have to have sex

with these different members
to solidify their alliance,

to solidify their loyalty.

He made a lot of really
crude remarks.

"If I need to get you to socialism on
the tip of my [bleep], I'll do it."

Each time he had sex with somebody,

he did it as one more notch
in his belt

of how to become yet more powerful.

Jones always said,
the ends justifies the means,

which means you can do anything
you need to do

to get to where you wanna go because
the goal is for the greater good.

So, no matter how you get there,
you get there,

which excuses anything,
any behaviors at all.

To all outward appearances,

Jones and Peoples Temple
had accomplished great things

and there was unlimited future.

But the lust for power
continues to grow.

He would create enemies
to bind his followers closer.

VICTIMS OF CONSPIRACY

The government was out
to get us and it was a conspiracy.

CONSPIRACY!

JIM JONES USED
HIS CHURCH NEWSPAPER

TO SPREAD PROPOGANDA
TO HIS FOLLOWERS.

Look at all the people
that have been killed.

Look at all of our young people
who are in prison.

Actual events were used
to solidify his position,

and it was extremely effective
because there was truth to it.

I've just come in from Washington,
just flew in on the plane

from the conference
with the top-notch leaders.

I listened to them
talk about planned takeovers.

I listened to them to talk about it

like it was just an ordinary Sunday
school picnic.

Task force warns nation to get
ready for riots

and to get ready for martial law.

They're gonna put
all the poor people away,

and they're gonna come for you,
they're gonna come for your children.

There was so much paranoia
about the ways that

law enforcement was going to break up
the community of Peoples Temple.

They looked at themselves as people

who were being persecuted
from the outside.

We ended up going to church
more and more.

Before you knew it, your whole life
was all based around the church.

Now we're in isolationist mode,
where Jim would tell us that we were,

you know, that black people were
gonna be put in concentration camps.

Dictatorships that can come in
like they did with the Japanese.

It's all, this country won't ever
do that. They did it already!

He's tapping into people's fears,

he's tapping
into people's insecurities.

The paranoia was real
in Peoples Temple.

Get ready for identification
marks to be put on your body,

an identification number even
necessarily tattooed on you.

You say, oh,
America wouldn't do that.

Don't talk to me about
what America would not do.

We've lived through Martin
being assassinated.

We've lived through Malcolm
being assassinated.

We lived through Robert Kennedy
being assassinated.

Assassination for leaders
was something you thought about.

Jim would say that he was
getting death threats

because he was making
such a difference

and stirring up so much
controversy in the community

of bringing black people
and white people together

that he was a threat
to the status quo.

MAY 1972

One Sunday service,

I was out in the parking lot,
talking to someone.

We're all out after church
and we're having festivities

and kids are playing
on the basketball court.

We got tables out
for the meal in between church.

Bright, sunny, beautiful day.
We were enjoying ourselves.

And then all hell broke loose.

People were screaming,
father's shot!

There's blood flowing
from his chest.

Father's been shot,
and screams and a lot of anguish,

people crying out.

There's someone trying to
assassinate Jim Jones.

Subtitles: Plint
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