While we are all having a conversation about journalism, here’s something the FBI posted last week. This is film taken by NBC’s Bob Brown on Nov. 18, 1978 on an airstrip near Jonestown, Guyana. That’s my dad, Ron Javers, in the floppy hat + big ‘70s beard. vault.fbi.gov/jonestown/jone…
What you see here is the delegation led by Congressman Leo Ryan evacuating Jonestown, where the evil cult leader Jim Jones had taken hundreds of followers to build a secluded compound. Some of the people in this video are about to die.
The congressman was in Guyana to protect his constituents - Americans who had families in his congressional district. The journalists were there to find out what was going on and to tell the truth about it: Real news.
Things had gone badly at Jonestown - the place was seething with tension and hostility. Ryan decided it was time to get his people out, and led his staff, the reporters and some defectors from the cult to this airstrip to go home. They almost made it.
Everyone was jumpy. They could feel things spinning out of control. You can see my dad &Tim Reiterman frisking people at the plane - improvising security at direction of @RepSpeier, who was a young congressional staffer. They were worried someone might have a gun. Someone did.
Cult members loyal to Jones leapt from a tractor and began firing. Ryan, defector Patricia Parks, NBC correspondent Don Harris and San Francisco Examiner photographer Greg Robinson were killed. Bob Brown, who filmed these images, was also killed.
Some were killed instantly and some were wounded and unable to move. My dad, Jackie Speier and others were shot and wounded but able to make a harrowing escape into the jungle. The gunmen murdered the wounded who were not able to run for it.
All this happened at roughly the same time that more than 900 people were being murdered or committing suicide at Jones’ command back at the compound. That’s where the expression “drinking the Kool Aid” comes from, by the way. Don’t use it lightly.
This was just one day in one jungle in one part of the world. There is always be evil - it’s part of humanity. But we are fortunate that there are journalists willing to face it and expose it for what it is. That’s real news.
Here’s the story my dad filed as he was medically evacuated by the US military: “Bob Brown stayed on his feet and kept filming what was happening even as the attackers advanced on him with their guns. He was incredibly tenacious.” Real news.
s.hdnux.com/photos/54/35/4…
s.hdnux.com/photos/54/35/4…
