Was Jonestown a CIA Medical Experiment? - Ch. 12

8/18/2019 Was Jonestown a CIA Medical Experiment? - Ch. 12

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4/21/2015 web.archive.org/web/20091130184330/http://www.fonebone.net/Jonestown/12.Chap.txt

http://web.archive.org/web/20091130184330/http://www.fonebone.net/Jonestown/12.Chap.txt

Orignal page 407 Jonetown

XII ONE COOKIE

The first outsiders to reach the Jonestown Medical Clinic in the aftermath of the carnage found enough drugs to supply an average U.S. city for over a year. Predominant in the stock of narcotics were the hypnotic drugs Pentothal and Nembutal as well as over ten thousand injectible dosages of a chloral-hydrate compound known as chlorpromazine or Thorazine. Thorazine increases the production of certain histamines in important parts of the brain. It is used primarily to alter the violent behavior of mental patients and, according the one article published by the Black Panthers, Thorazine and its related compounds are common ingredients in the CIA's MK ULTRA experiments. The article buttressed its argument by quoting Jones who reportedly told

a visiting Swiss psychologist that his Black followers were given Thorazine on a regular basis as per orders of the CIA. Although these drugs are used to alter a person's behavior, it is highly unlikely that they were the test drugs used in the Jonestown experiment as Jones would never have allowed such incriminating evidence to be


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discovered in the aftermath. The two unidentified drugs used in the experiment were far more advanced than those found in the rubble of Jonestown but, due to the top secret nature of the experiment, the precise chemical formulas will never be disclosed.

In order to accurately compare the effects of mind control or behavior modification drugs on a group of test persons all other stimuli must first be removed. The jungle community provided the isolation necessary for Jones to substitute himself for all outside influences of society. Jonestown residents were forbidden to consume alcohol, tobacco and even sugar; necessary but ironic as Guyana ranks among the world's sugar-producing nations. The diet of Jones-town, though prepared by the kitchen staff, was under the direct and stringent control of the medical staff. Once all outside influences had been removed and "ground zero" reached, the medical staff proceeded to drug the different test groups without their knowledge. Since the intent was long-term control, the drugs were administered in small repeated doses rather than one large dose. The most successful drug tested could then be deployed in society by

introducing it into fast foods or the water supply or the glue on the back of postage stamps.

A few visitors to Jonestown noted that the residents were drugged. One such observer was Frank Tumminia, the State Department's desk officer for Guyana, who visited Jonestown on February 2, 1978, with John Blacken, the Deputy Chief of Missions at the United States Embassy in Georgetown. Tumminia stated:

One of the things that struck me at the time and upon which I


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remarked to Embassy staff as well as to Department officials, was my feeling that many of the people with whom I met and spoke appeared drugged and robot-like in their reactions to questions and, generally, in their behavior towards us visitors.[165]

Tumminia and Blacken held positions in the State Department that were very important to this story. Tumminia's predecessor was President Kennedy, who was so concerned about a possible communist take-over in Guyana in the early 1960's that he personally manned the Guyana desk at the State Department to direct the efforts of the CIA operatives there. Among the operatives was one Jim Jones. Blacken's successor was CIA operative Dick Dwyer, who would be present at the airstrip to witness the assassination of Congressman Leo Ryan.

Though it will never be known which mind control drugs were administered to the test persons, it is known _ h_o_w the drugs were administered. In the post-Jonestown murder trial of Larry Layton, the defense attempted to establish that Layton had been drugged into participating in the assault team that killed congressman Leo Ryan and others at the airstrip. According to his defense lawyer, "Layton looked spaced out and was mumbling of a CIA conspiracy during the fatal airstrip shootout.[166] Prosecution witness Dale Parks, a member of the Jonestown medical staff who allegedly defected with the Ryan party and wrestled the gun from Layton at the airstrip, was pressed under cross-examination to admit to

drugging Layton and


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____________________

[165 Y] ee and Layton, P. 213.

[166

"]

Some Emotional Arguments in Layton's Murder Plot Trial," _ S_ a_ n _ F_ r_a_n_ c_ i_ s_c_o _C_h_ r_ o_ n_i_c_ l_ e_ , August 19, 1981.


others. According to a newspaper account of the court proceedings:

Parks agreed that large quantities of Thorazine and other drugs used in mental hospitals were available at Jonestown, but he denied knowing that milk shakes "spiked" with so-called mind- control drugs were given to Jonestown cultists on a regular basis.[167]

If milk shakes were used in administering the drugs , the practice was abandoned early in the experiment as this

method would have been terribly inefficient. The experimenter would not have been able to determine if the test person had consumed the entire drink (hence the premeasured dosage) or, worse yet, had given some of their drink to others unobserved. Also, the milkshake containers might survive and under chemical analysis expose the true nature of the experiment.

Larry Layton's sister, Deborah Layton Blakey, hinted at the truth in her post-defection affidavit that warned of the threat of mass suicide in Jonestown , "On Sunday we each received a cookie. "[168] She later elaborated on her statement in an account published in the Layton family's

history in which was written:

But the culinary high point came every week on Sunday evening, when the entire population would line up to receive a cookie from the hand of Jim Jones. The


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____________________

[167 "] Layton Trial Told of Jones' Brutal Control," _S_ a_ n _ F_ r_ a_n_c_ i_ s_ c_o _ C_h_r_ o_ n_ i_c_l_ e_ , August 29, 1981. 168Yee and Layton, P. 333.

[168 Y] ee and Layton, p 333.


cookies, made from cassava flour , were the only sweets allowed in Jonestown, and they were doled out by Jones himself.[169]

The cookies were made in Jonestown's "Experimental and Herbal Kitchen" that a 1977 Temple brochure described as: "The all-purpose kitchen where meals and treats are provided

for workers and residents."[170]

The test drugs were added to the cassava flour in the Jonestown flour mill. It was quite simple to keep the batches of flour, hence cookies, separated through the baking and distribution process. Extreme precautions were required in handling the potent drugs and the "Experimental Kitchen" soon adopted the stringent procedures of a research laboratory, as indicated by this published Temple report:

The dishes are cold water rinsed, washed and stacked, then washed in a soapy detergent with bleach and boiling water and put away...all

surfaces are continually scrubbed and sanitized from ceiling to floor to provide the most healthful environment.[171]

On Sunday evening, as each of the test persons approached the throne, Jones would select a cookie from one of the three containers at his side. He was intelligent enough to have memorized which test persons were in which group but, more than likely, the person's group was designated by his or her Temple membership


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____________________

[169 I] bid., P. 199.

[170 N] aiPaul, P. 133.

[171 I] bid. P. 134.


number or perhaps just in the predetermined perhaps order in which they lined up every Sunday evening to receive their

one cookie.

One and only one cookie was the rule._ _ _N_ o_ _ o_n_e_ , not even a preferred aide who otherwise enjoyed special privileges, was allowed more than one cookie. On one occasion, a young Black girl who was baking the cookies, in the kitchen, unaware that the flour had been spiked with drugs, handed one out an open window to her boyfriend. Temple guards, who monitored every step of the cookie production, reported the infraction to Jones. At the next community-wide meeting, the young girl and boy were called to the stage, ordered to disrobe and forced to have sex in full view of the entire congregation. Such was the humiliating punishment for

violating the one cookie rule and understandably so, as such an infraction would alter the controlled dosage and taint the test results.

There were only two other mandatory weekly rituals in Jonestown and both were related to the one cookie. The first was a weekly TPR examination in which the medical staff examined each of the test persons and recorded their temperature, blood pressure, respiratory system, weight and other health monitors in the Test Person's medical records. This was necessary to determine if the mind control drugs could be detected in standard medical examinations. Though the average American might have a physical examination once


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in five years, and the medical profession recommends (to their profit) a yearly exam, the Jonestown residents received a weekly examination. The second weekly ritual in Jonestown was the White Night rehearsal in which Jones ordered his congregation to


drink what they were told was poison and commit suicide for the "cause."

Following the final White Night, the Jonestown guards identified the dead and catalogued them in two separate groups, those who voluntarily drank cyanide and those who had to be forcibly injected. This took time to accomplish which accounts for the long delay before outsiders were allowed to enter the compound. As the cause of death was noted on the medical records of each Test Person, the

corpses were dragged to one side and placed in neat, orderly piles. This was a mistake, as death from cyanide poisoning is preceded by such violent contortions that victims often die with only the top of their head and the heels of their feet touching the ground. The Jonestown residents could never have died in the neat, orderly piles in which they were found.

The medical records, the embodiment of racial weaponry, were missing in the aftermath of Jonestown which was another mistake. The existence of such extensive records had been well documented and their absence in the aftermath confirms that some unknown residents escaped and considered the


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records worth taking; an interesting priority judgment considering that several hundred thousand dollars in cash was not taken. It would have been better to have kept two separate sets of medical records and left one phony copy behind but, considering the complexity of the project, Jones is granted these few damning mistakes.

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Was Jonestown a CIA Medical Experiment? - Ch. 12