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Despite being based in San Francisco The Concerned Relatives played a key role in the events at took place in Guyana, Jonestown. To some extent the pressure that they exerted on Jim Jones is the key to understanding many of the disastrous descisions that he took throughout the autumn of 1978.
From late 1977 The Concerned Relatives campaigned for an investigation of Jonestown, alleging that many were being held there against their will in inhumane conditions. The group of relatives were formed by high profile and successful lawyer Tim Stoen, an ex member of The Temple who had been Jim jones'; chief strategist for several years. Stoen knew the Temple and Jones intimately. Stoen's main concern was to gain custody over seven year old John Victor Stoen (who's parents were in fact his wife Grace Stoen and Jim Jones). Jones regarded John Victor as his own son and was determined to fight the custody claim.
Other ex members had shifted their unrelenting focus of advancing "the Cause" of the Temple to a fanaticism in destroying it. This phase shift from "true believer" to "skeptic" is emblematic of the allegations that the Concerned Relatives raised with various US authorities; including the state department and Congress.
There were also relatives who could not understand how their loved ones could claim the community they lived among as more family than their blood family. The construction of a non biological communal family (Jones was known as 'Dad' in Jonestown) created one of the largest gulfs between the The Temple and the Concerned Relatives, who held to the conventional ideology of the nuclear family. In this sense losing the custody case of John Victor would have meant more to Jones than simply a personal loss. In the custody of only one parent (Jones) John Victor symbolised the principle of the The Temples communalist view.
Their first publicity event On April11, 1978, a demonstration outside San Francisco Peoples Temple, accused the Temple of "employing physical intimidation and psychological coercion as part of a mind-programming campaign aimed at destroying family ties, discrediting a belief in God, and causing contempt for United States of America." Later they accused Jonestown of being like a concentration camp, ringed with barbed wire with starving inhabitants. Various alleged financial and other abuses were also published in a series of articles in the San Francisco, 'New West' magazine.
In several visits to Jonestown US embassy consul Richard McCoy noted that five or six hundred residents he saw looked well fed and expressed satisfaction with their lives. He also conducted private interviews with seventy five named individuals all of whom refused offers of help to leave Jonestown. Others have criticised McCoy's rigour and gullibilty, and state that Jonestown residents were carefully briefed on what to say to visitors to the community. Mc Coy also believed that if someone really wanted to depart, especially a young adult, they would have been able to fade into the jungle and walk the five miles to Port Kaituma. (Exactly this happened shortly before one of McCoy's visits. When pressed on the matter Jones agreed to pay for the young mans flight back to the US. There were also allegations that the young man had been beaten before he departed).
The Concerned Relatives continued to pursue various legal cases including the high profile custody case for the child John Victor, and other custody and libel cases.
The tense oppositional situation generated by the court cases and accusations created paranoia in both groups.
The Concerned Relatives were an organised opposition that were prepared to use false accusations and deception to dismantle Jonestown. Essentially a fully fledged anti cult movement. Deanna Mertle and her husband, some of the initial Concerned Relatives had even set up a house called the "Human Freedom Centre" in preparation for returning liberated Jonestown residents, who they believed would flood back to the US as soon as they were freed.
In Guyana Jones' responded with a publicity campaign of his own, issuing press releases denying the accusations with testimony from Jonestown residents. Measures were also taken to form a security force and tighten security at Jonestown (fearing an attack). Residents were banned from leaving the compound, and Guyanese locals from entering. (previously they had worked together in the fields). The first White Night was held. Alerts with their endless and intense meetings were held regularly, decreasing the general productivity in the community. Survivor Odell Rhodes remembers the food, formerly one of the glories at Jonestown soon became a bland medley of rice and vegetables.
Whilst these and other actions taken at Jonestown were used to confirm the Concerned Relatives thesis, they were not without their own problems. US Consul Richard McCoy observed, "The Concerned Relatives had a credibility problem, since so many of their claims were untrue." Though Mc Coy was also uneasy over the events that were unfolding in Jonestown.
An official from State Department recounted, "Because of the starkly conflicting, emotional and, in some respects, bizarre nature of the information provided by the Concerned Relatives and the Temple, and because of the deep bitterness and suspicion that the two groups exhibited toward each other doubts inevitably arose about the motives and credibility of either side."
With the court cases moving slowly in Guyana and the US, the Concerned Relatives contacted Congressman Leo Ryan who was broadly sympathetic to a fact finding mission to Jonestown. For the Concerned Relatives a trip to Jonestown meant the possibility of 'retrieving' relatives and viewing the situation for themselves.
The Congressional delegation consisting of Concerned Relatives, Leo Ryan, Embassy staff and TV and Newspaper reporters entered Jonestown on November17, 1978. Undoubtedly Jones regarded the visit as a humiliating intrusion.
Members of delegation spent the night at Jonestown, while the press were told they would have to return to nearby Port Kaituma for the night. The next day November 18 Ryan found sixteen residents who wanted to leave Jonestown. late in the afternoon and after some considerable trouble the delegation headed back to Port Kaituma airfield.
Jones saw the sixteen defections as the beginning of end. Meanwhile loyal Temple residents attacked the Congressional party at the airfield with rifles killing Ryan, three of the journalists and one defector. Ten others were wounded, and one of the planes disabled.
Back in Jonestown Jones made preparations for the end.
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