where is larry layton today
Many hours before the plane came, somehow, word filtered in that after Jones had released his death squad to the airstrip, he had led more than 900 of his flock into his White Night of death. If convicted, Layton could receive a mandatory life sentence for Ryan's killing, up to 20 years for the attempted killing of Dwyer, and up to life on each of the two conspiracy counts. A $300-million (minimum) gondola to Dodger Stadium? Layton's sister Debbie's departure from the Peoples Temple and denunciation of Jones in May 1978 led her brother to leave California to join the settlement in Guyana. The "Greeting Committee" promptly confiscated all their clothes and belongings and, most important, their passports. We didnt want a group to present a canned response or any individual to look to others for their answers. died drinking juice?". because I was too In the months leading up to the trip, my boss, Congressman Leo Ryan, had been contacted by worried constituents whose loved ones were members of a San Francisco-based religious group called the Peoples Temple, which had fled to South America for the promise of a utopian commune led by their preacher, Jim Jones. My list kept growingwhat started with two names was now more than 40. With the camp surrounded by his armed guards, he told his followers to give the medicinegrape FlavorAid and Kool-Aid laced with cyanide and tranquilizersto the children and the elderly first. His appearance was part of the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program. Whatever impelled me to send in the card changed the course of my life. Personal Reflections. The icon which characterizes Jonestown in the public mind is a picture of a galvanized metal vat, surrounded by bloated bodies. They were issued four T-shirts, four pairs of socks, a toothbrush and toothpaste, four pairs of underwear and a bar of soap. "When I joined Peoples Temple, I was 17 and it was like joining the Peace Corps," she says. Rep. Leo Ryan, who was working with San Francisco area residents worried Dwyer, who was wounded in the attack, has retired from the Foreign Service. Over 900 people, including 304 children, killed themselves by drinking from a vat of grape-flavored drink laced with cyanide. It paints a convincing picture of what it was like to spend seven years in the notorious cult, only to escape a few months before the tragedy that gave Jonestown its infamous place in history as the site of the largest mass suicide in modern times. about [31] The DVDs contained condensed versions of Lawton's program and were 67 minutes long. At the compound, Don wandered off to smoke a cigarette. What episode does Luna get Ancient Fairy Dragon? Lawton filed a lawsuit against the prison and staff alleging that they violated his rights. White Night!" "You consistently wind up finding yourself trying to heal but having your wounds opened up again when new information is given," she said. Jones was found shot through the head. The approach continued even after hed moved from Sacramento to Washington, D.C. same time, it's because of those secrets that I think my mother and my grandmother Layton thought had died of a heart attack in Hamburg actually How did the Peoples Temple recruit members? I spoke with a woman named Edith Parks, the matriarch of three generations of Temple members who wanted out. His battles with the church arent over, How Palm Springs ran out Black and Latino families to build a fantasy for rich, white people, U.N. envoy says Sudans warring sides agree to negotiate, Yellen says U.S. could hit debt ceiling as soon as June 1, U.S. says 20,000 Russians killed in Ukraine war since December, Speaker Kevin McCarthy addresses Knesset amid fraught U.S.-Israel ties, First Republic: Cheap, interest-only jumbo mortgages to Silicon Valleys elite fueled the banks failure. Ryan did not look or behave like your typical politician. Repeatedly, the defectors mentioned forced participation in mass-suicide rehearsals known as the White Night trials.. When people refer to the Jonestown massacre as a mass suicide, I am enraged. Again, Larry was held in jail while he awaited trial. Even later, she learned another All of those children. Water is sufficient for hydration unless you are participating in an activity that lasts longer than one hour. I would never have left Jonestown with Congressman Ryan. In the two years since, Jones and most of his followers had left the Bay Area and moved to Jones commune deep in the jungle of Guyana. SAN FRANCISCO (AP) _ Former Peoples Temple member Larry Layton was met with frightened screams when he boarded a truck full of people trying to flee the Rev. But he was acquitted, partly because witnesses would not return there from the United States. [25] He received an additional sentence in 2002 for giving false witness. chaperone of a youth group. Youll see what a wonderful place it is. He took us on a tour highlighting the most favorable aspects of the commune. I just needed to hang on. "All the hair on my arm and my neck came up. Congressman Ryan assured me that there was nothing to worry about. If there is such a thing as a spirit or essence of people . Don put it in his pocket and took a few more steps before carefully unfolding it. November 18, 1978 When did the Jonestown massacre occur? "It was devastating to him. Although Larry Layton must be held responsible for his actions, a just sentence requires consideration of the environment in which Layton and other members were virtually imprisoned, Peckham said. I only wish there was something I could do to ease the pain, he said, fighting to keep his voice from breaking. one last, Layton, 41, is the only former Peoples Temple member who was tried in the United States in connection with the slaughter on Nov. 18, 1978. Before I could even comprehend what was happening, about a dozen men leapt from the tractor, leveled their automatic weapons, and fast approached. [21] Lawton was arrested by the FBI on December 2, 1996, in Florida and charged with the Fairless Hills armed robbery. contentment. How to plan a weekend getaway to Mount Shasta, Your Privacy Choices (Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads). Larry Lawton. Lawton was critical of the move, saying that "[c]hain gangs send a bad message about [the US]." Horoscope for Monday, 5/01/23 by Christopher Renstrom, Dubs fans picking apart video of possible Poole-Draymond incident, Destructive landslide closes historic California institution, Major SF retail store slated to permanently close, Warriors' biggest hater made a cowardly Game 7 'bet', Draymond Green rips Domantas Sabonis: 'Lost a lot of respect', More rain, 'unseasonably chilly' temperatures coming to Bay Area, Esalen Institute sued over alleged use of video with the N-word, Shock, fear as 2 killings in 3 days rock quiet Davis, Bay Area mom influencer found guilty of lying about kidnapping, Bay Area preschool teacher suspected of dumping body along road, 49ers out in full force at Warriors-Kings Game 7. I had read the articles and listened to hours of testimony. [27] Lawton says he regrets his time spent in prison, because he missed out on seeing his children grow up; his grandmother died, and his father became afflicted with Alzheimer's disease while he was inside. [28] Often he appears discussing crimes in the media as an expert on robberies. Her startling introduction to life there quickly allowed Layton to see the cracks in the facade. Infants cannot commit suicide. Jonestown massacre In Jonestown Only one man, Temple member Larry Layton, was tried in the United States for his involvement in the November 18 events. I have no idea how much time passed until I turned my head and opened my eyes. The suit was later dismissed. [19][20] One bullet narrowly missed Lawton, but struck his brother. I barely got a wink of sleep. I would be in the first group; Congressman Ryan insisted that he stay behind to make certain that every person who wanted to leave made it to Port Kaituma safely. U.S. District Judge Robert F. Peckham recommended that parole authorities consider releasing Layton in five years. Jones had a penchant for suddenly getting on the compound loudspeaker long after everyone had gone to bed and shouting, "White Night! "They were looking for something larger than themselves to be involved He was cracking. Don't Miss Audio:. Larry Layton, a passenger posing as a defector, started shooting. Nearly 300 children were administered the poison with no comprehension of what it meant, including a number of infants in the arms of their parents. Some were cremated. Peoples Temple was successful in recruiting new members because they always provided what the community needed, a case of supply and demand. | AP. [8][12] At one point, he purchased an Italian pizza restaurant in North Lauderdale, Florida, which he later burned down as part of an insurance fraud. Anyone running afoul of Jonestowns security detail was put in a labor camp and forced to clear jungle. Larry now lives in Northern California. [10][26] While recounting his prison experiences he said: "I saw inmates stabbed and friends die" and "I saw young men raped and pimped out as prostitutes for other inmates. Politically, there was nothing to gainand everything to loseby taking on Jones, and there was no telling what hed do if confronted and challenged. SAN FRANCISCO -- Former People's Temple member Larry Layton, freed from jail Thursday for the first time since the cult's 1978 mass murder-suicide ritual in Guyana, will be retried on. Lawton gained notoriety for committing a string of jewelry store robberies along the Atlantic Seaboard prior to his arrest in 1996. When she tried to write about abandoning her mother, who would die 10 But at the time, none of that occurred to me; I was thrilled to be working for a candidate I believed inone who always treated me with respect. We split up, as Jones had arranged. [30] In 2009, the Brevard County Sheriff's Office spent $4500 on 500 DVDs from the Reality Check program. What an evil thing that Jim Jones did. I knew him well enough to understand what would happen next. Excerpt from UNDAUNTED: Surviving Jonestown, Summoning Courage, and Fighting Back by Jackie Speier, reprinted under a license arrangement originating with Amazon Publishing. His first encounter with organized crime was through his father, a metal worker who delivered bribes to the New York mafia. Children had their own special punishment, Layton writes. Offenders sweltered in "The Box," a 6-by-4-foot Layton was originally charged in Guyana with the attempted murder of three defectors from the Peoples Temple. Ryan wanted to investigate. I was one of Larry's lead lawyers in his first U.S. trial in 1981, which resulted in an 11 to 1 vote for acquittal on faulty charges of conspiracy to kill the congressman. It was coined after a delusional, pseudo-guru named Jim Jones led his cult, the Peoples Temple, to mass suicide. by She managed to contact her sister in Davis, who wired a ticket to Georgetown, where Layton and other Temple members were staying in a house the Temple owned. He was not paroled from an American prison until 2002. Born to poverty in the small West Virginia coal-mining town of Boomer, Mr. Layton went from Gauley Bridge High School to a bachelor's degree in mathematics from the West Virginia Institute of Technology and, later, a doctorate in biochemistry from Pennsylvania State University. GEORGETOWN, Guyana, Jan. 2 (AP) A Guyanese magistrate ruled today that Larry Layton, a member of the People's Temple, must stand trial in the slaying of Representative Leo J. Ryan. Jones had ordered the ambush out of fear that Ryan would expose the cult. First the children; poison was squirted into babies' mouths with a syringe. She left with her 8-month-old daughter before the massacre. But how? Lawrence Robert Lawton (born October 3, 1961) is an American ex-convict, author, paralegal, motivational speaker, and YouTuber. They Ryan joined us for the trekone of roughly two dozen of us crammed in the bed of the truck, with dozens of would-be defectors left behind, belongings packed, waiting to escape. [28], After release he went to Palm Bay, Florida and started LL Research and Consulting and met a business partner. A former Quaker and a conscientious objector during the Vietnam war, Layton also faces three other counts in the indictment: conspiracy to kill Ryan, conspiracy to kill Richard Dwyer, deputy chief of the United States mission in Guyana, and the attempted murder of Dwyer. The Kool-Aid Man is a huge anthropomorphic pitcher filled with some red substance which may be either Kool-Aid itself, blood, or something else entirely. Before going to print, the editor of the magazine, who held some esteem for Jones, felt compelled to call him and read aloud the article before it went to press. He spent 12 years in prison, and once released, began a career as a motivational speaker, life coach, and author. But the moment I looked down at my own body is locked in my mind. "He kept holding on," Deborah Layton said, "holding on with the hope that some day Larry might be released from prison.". The article dissected Joness rise, revealing his practices of manipulation, public humiliation and fake faith healings, called out the Temples corrupt financial structure, and included ex-members testimonies of sexual assault and brutal beatings by Jones or at his command. Then the adults. Layton, 35, was scheduled for arraignment today before Magistrate John Caden in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn on charges of killing Ryan, D-Calif., who was gunned down on Nov. 18, 1978 by . As soon as it became clear that we would be bringing more than one or two defectors home with us, the communal faade cracked. SAN FRANCISCO . [44] Lawton has a YouTube channel, and he has made videos analyzing heists in movies and video games such as Grand Theft Auto V; he also plays Prison Architect. Mr. Layton's children said his one wish in his later years was that his son, Larry, could be freed. Ten days later, on November 18, Jones and 912 of his followers committed mass suicide. The next year, his church relocated to Redwood Valley, a small community in northern California. "I was ready to be overwhelmed by emotion," she says, "but when we got into the area, it just wasn't there. Northern California Larry now lives in Northern California.. Northern California He said that some of the recipients could be innocent. During World War II, he did research on cancer and the healing of wounds at Johns Hopkins University's School of Hygiene and Public Health in Baltimore. security guards. at the Perhaps death is better than this.". Leo Ryan wanted answers. in. Ryan had gone to Guyana to investigate reports that relatives of his San Francisco-area constituents wre being held against their will. Before the New West issue hit the stands, Jones and hundreds of his followers had left San Francisco for Jonestown, their promised land in Guyana. When people refer to the Jonestown massacre as a mass suicide, I am enraged. Back in the compound, Jones was choreographing NBC news correspondent Don Harris was part of our delegation, and was well versed on the accusations against Jones. believed he could best survive the atomic apocalypse he expected. It turned out to be a sort of family Its leader, the Rev. The discovery reopened wounds. Infants cannot commit suicide. But this particular morning, Jones told his followers that they had to kill themselves to keep from being tortured by mercenaries who were preparing an ambush. It was a message that appealed to the dispossessed, which is why it made sense for the Peoples Temple to relocate to San Francisco around 1972. Oh my God: Its true. Each cup of Kool-Aid has 20 grams of sugar, or to be precise, the equivalent of 5 teaspoons of sugar. Laytons lawyer said that made Layton more susceptible to Jones spell. He treasured it. Nearly 300 children were administered the poison, including a number of infants in the arms of their parents. [41], In 2017, he appeared in a middle school in Havelock, North Carolina to explain his prison experiences. Charismatic and tall with salt-and-pepper hair, he commanded a room. were sort of pushed onto the path of looking for answers -- and that Jim Today. "If I hadn't been sent to Georgetown that day (in May)," Deborah Layton says now, "I would have died in Jonestown. only one I Bodies lay crumpled on the tarmac around me. She had an extremely anxious demeanor, and we moved quickly as we went to her cabin to pack. They had passed. Then, she wrote "Seductive Poison," her account of events leading up to seemed to have them for us.". L.A. Times Archives. Kool-Aid is high in sugar or contains artificial sweetener and has little to no nutritional value. He and four others were killed. "It's just so sad, for me as a survivor," said Yulanda Williams, 58, now a sergeant with the San Francisco Police Department. [15] The robbers took $480,000 ($910,600.81 in 2022)[17] worth of gold and diamonds making it the biggest robbery in the city's history. All of those people I had been standing beside, speaking to, sharing a cabin with. After the war, Mr. Layton had a series of government jobs. Dead vines hung from the building's white plaster walls, and cracked windows were repaired with blue tape. It was 1970, and she was on summer vacation from the British boarding school He had completed his mission and was trying to take off from an airstrip six miles from the jungle compound of Jonestown when a trailer filled with eight armed Jones devotees pulled onto the runway and began firing. The store owner managed to break free and grabbed a .38 caliber pistol and fired five shots at the robbers as they fled. blew open," she says. Vernon Gosney and Monica Bagby, it read. [22] Fingerprint evidence connected Lawton to the October 1994 Palm Bay heist, and he was charged with that crime as well. The outfits were a ridiculous gimmick, and the role was clearly objectifying. Layton became a senior insider in Jones' entourage. Jones ran the Peoples Temple in San Francisco in the early 1970s. [15] The robbers had dropped off jewelry for repairs, and later returned to rob the store. Generator vs power station: Which one is right for you? That same day, precipitated by the shootings, over 900 members of the People's Temple Cult led by Reverend Jim Jones died in Jonestown, Guyana of mass murder and suicide. Few heeded. U.S. Atty. [15][18], In 1996, there was a robbery of a jeweler in Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania. Layton and her mother arrived in Jonestown in December 1977. Glenn Youngkin rules out presidential campaign while in California, 7 bodies found during search for missing Oklahoma teens, US to lift most federal COVID-19 vaccine mandates next week, Multiple fatalities on Illinois highway during a blinding windstorm. I noticed an elderly woman stuffing pieces of bacon into her pockets; the ample spread was just another showpiece. | AP. With Joness wild gaze on us, I tape-recorded affidavits of their wishes to return to the United States. It was impossible to cope with the pain. He was met with mostly beaming declarations One of three family members who joined the cult, he was convicted Dec. 1 of conspiring with Jones to murder Ryan, a crusading San Mateo Democrat, and of conspiring in the attack on Richard C. Dwyer, then deputy chief of the U.S. mission in Guyana. Find showtimes and movie tickets near you at Megaplex Theatres. Five bullets hit me from point-blank range, piercing my right arm, leg, and back. Within a year, a few Jonestown defectors had managed to return to the Bay Areamost notably, Debbie Layton Blakey, whod been Jones trusted aide and worked as the Temples financial secretary. Instead, she grabbed her daughter's acrylic paints Laurence Laird Layton, a distinguished scientist whose later life was devastated by his family's involvement with the Peoples Temple cult, died Wednesday in his Emeryville home. In a cabin with about six women from the Temple, I took a top bunk, sweating as a downpour opened up outside. Unrivaled Mac notes apps for fuss-free note-taking, 6 Actionable Tips for Improving Your Websites SEO, Copyright 2023 | WordPress Theme by MH Themes. fixture. Layton was already aboard one of the two planes, posing as a defector. Moments later, Congressman Ryan emerged from a throng of people with a torn and bloodied shirt. Dwyer, Speier and nine others were wounded. Behind the wheel of an airplane, I waited for the shooting to stop and said my Act of Contrition, praying for forgiveness and waiting for the lights to go out. Layton and other temple members then ambushed the congressman and his party at the airstrip, according to an indictment returned against Layton last month in San Francisco. (CHRONICLE PHOTO BY SUSANNA FROHMAN), Horoscope for Monday, 5/01/23 by Christopher Renstrom, Dubs fans picking apart video of possible Poole-Draymond incident, Destructive landslide closes historic California institution, Major SF retail store slated to permanently close, Warriors' biggest hater made a cowardly Game 7 'bet', Draymond Green rips Domantas Sabonis: 'Lost a lot of respect', More rain, 'unseasonably chilly' temperatures coming to Bay Area, Esalen Institute sued over alleged use of video with the N-word, Shock, fear as 2 killings in 3 days rock quiet Davis, Bay Area mom influencer found guilty of lying about kidnapping, Bay Area preschool teacher suspected of dumping body along road, 49ers out in full force at Warriors-Kings Game 7. I was kicked. On Thursday, officials revealed that not all had been brought to a final resting place. By the time I returned, more than 900 people died. Behind his dim glasses, Jones preached love and equality while manipulating his followerstaking their property and having them sign over their paychecks and Social Security. In Congress, he joined a March 1978 Greenpeace mission to investigate the slaughter of baby seals in Newfoundland, Canada. In the fall of 1978, Ryan decided to visit Guyana to find out what was happening to the more than 900 members of Jonestown, many of whom were his constituents from the San Francisco area who'd. Ive shared my Guyana story countless times, but its still a challenge to go back and relive those days. Misbehaving children were He. secret, that her mother had fled Nazi Germany.). At Port Kaituma, while I ushered the defectors onto a plane, a large red tractor-trailer rumbled onto the airstrip. Roper estimates that if the Kool-Aid Man were brought up to the scale represented in the iconic ads, he would measure about 6 feet tall, have a dry weight of almost 6,000 pounds (11,000 pounds when filled with Kool-Aid), and his glass frame would measure 3.6 inches thick. well, it wasn't there. [6][11] In 2010, Lawton filmed the pilot and sizzle reel for Lawton's Law, a reality show based on his work with at-risk youth. None of those red flags made the congressman reconsider. During my freshman year at UC Davis, when I told him about my major, he offered encouragement: If you really want to learn about political science, you should come and intern in my office. I did, and over the years, worked my way up from volunteer to intern to staffer to senior aide, just as he climbed from the state Assembly to the U.S. Congress. Instead he proposed a better use of law enforcement resources would be to "help inmates with drug addiction. His following grew, and Jones became the leader of one of the first mixed-race churches in Indiana. Deep inside me, I still have the demons of shame and guilt.". [10] High school students can use the time spent in the program towards the 75 hours of community service required for the Bright Futures Scholarship Program. At the end of the evening, Rep. Ryan walked onstage and thanked the group. Although some of Joness most zealous followers may have consumed the poison voluntarily, the vast majority were murdered outright and against their will. Georgetown, "I knew we'd entered a prison camp and I knew I wanted out. [26] Lawton does not hold a degree in child psychology or criminology. Chief among my concerns was how cozy Jones appeared to be with members of the embassy: How could any Jonestown resident feel safe reporting an injustice to a U.S. official who is arm in arm with Jim Jones in every image? Twenty years after Jonestown, a survivor looks back. Once out, Layton sounded the alarm: Jones planned to force his followers While on the phone listening to the allegations that would soon be made public, Jones scribbled a note to his aides: We leave tonight.. There was a scary side to the Peoples Temple -- beatings of fractious members, He had on a big yellow poncho, and his eyes were set in a sullen glare. Nobody joined thinking their lives would be taken.". sweeping He called Layton the ultimate victim of Jim Jones.. | AP. Williams spent a decade with the Peoples Temple, including three months in Jonestown, named after the group's founder, Jim Jones. As I was lying seven miles away waiting for medical help, Sam Houstons granddaughters, Patricia and Judy, 14 and 15, were murdered, along with their mother, dozens of other would-be defectors and the rest of the Peoples Temple. View the profiles of professionals named "Larry Layton" on LinkedIn. fields, subsisting mostly on rice, Layton writes. Hurrying out of bed, Layton would race toward Jones "in my mud-caked boots, past the tin-roofed cabins, past the wooden outdoor showers where we're allowed our two-minute wash at the end of our 11-hour days in the field." When cameras were rolling, he spoke of how he loved them and how there would always be a place for thembut those declarations would be followed by thinly veiled mutters about treason and liars. tradition. Soon, her mother would also join the Temple. UNDAUNTED: Surviving Jonestown, Summoning Courage, and Fighting Back, write a letter to President Jimmy Carter extolling Joness work, California's road to recovery runs through D.C. Republicans, Why New Jerseys ventilator guidelines may favor younger, whiter patients, Rhode Island ends specific restrictions on New Yorkers by making them national. [10], Lawton also founded the Reality Check Foundation, which is a 501(C)(3) charity that includes a mentoring program, and an annual golf outing. He told you precisely what was on his mind, no matter who you were or whether or not you wanted to hear it. Reassured that they were on their way, we parked ourselves at a few picnic tables in the far corner of the pavilion area. Last week, though, the ashes of nine victims were found neatly packaged and clearly marked, with the names of the deceased and place of their death included on accompanying death certificates, the Delaware Division of Forensic Science said Thursday. [7] He became known as one of America's biggest jewel thieves and made the FBI's most wanted list in 1996. "It was a warm day and all of a sudden a breeze came up and the back door At the airport, Temple members who found out she was fleeing implored her not to leave. Larry Allan Layton, 68, was charged with two counts of reckless endangerment and one count of disorderly conduct. It was the final stop for a group that for nearly 10 years had fascinated and, in the end, horrified the Bay Area. A few Temple members stood in front of a rusty dump truck waiting to shuttle us to the compound. With its bell-ringing calls for social justice -- this was in the fractious 1960s and early '70s -- the little-known church near Ukiah catered to the closet revolutionary in Deborah Layton. In Jonestown, the able-bodied among the 1,000 or so residents worked the "All the survivors in touch with me are traumatized because that door had been closed," said Jonestown survivor Laura Johnston Kohl, now a retired teacher from San Diego. A self-anointed minister, as a young man he started proselytizing outside a storefront church in Indianapolis, and by 1955, had formed the Wings of Deliverance church. I wanted to leave my daughter a legacy that wasn't that simple.". Meanwhile, ex-devotees of the Peoples Temple began sharing stories about Jones darker side. It looked staged. He With Ryan dead, Jones concluded that the United States would retaliate, so he exhorted his followers to kill themselves by drinking cyanide-laced punch. This time, it was not a drill. a life I couldnt immediately identify the deafening sound that filled the air. Peoples Temple gunman Larry Layton would not testify on his own behalf and opposed an insanity plea . can really trust," or by the knowledge that failure meant punishment, physical [25], Law enforcement officials and judges have supported the program. Those who refused were shot; children were injected with poison. [18], Lawton is believed to have hit around 20 to 25 jewelry stores,[11] stealing a self-estimated total of around $1518 million worth of high-value items, including watches, diamonds, and other gems.
