Years later, after Lisa Layton Joined the People's Temple, she would tell other members of the cult that her husband had been antiSemitic and was ashamed of her being a Jew. Dr. Layton was perplexed by his wife's behavior but began sleeping beside her on the floor. Dont know why youre here, but were happy to have you, Jones said. Sure enough, I could tell he had. Mr. Layton cried as his attorney described conditions at Jonestown and said that many prosecution witnesses must feel guilty for leaving loved ones behind to die. My mother had cared a lot for my father, but Jim broke it up.. I barely got a wink of sleep. "[33] Lawton and the police chief later appeared before United States Congress in recognition of the program. [22] Fingerprint evidence connected Lawton to the October 1994 Palm Bay heist, and he was charged with that crime as well. Jonestown: 13 Things You Should Know About Cult Mas. '', ''In a sense,'' he said, ''it would be easy to transfer the responsibility of Jones and put it on Larry Layton.'' March 5, 1999. "Every week we're ordered to drink some liquid," she writes, culling her memories of the "old tapes (of Jonestown recollections that) are running in my head. ''Why not pin this on Larry Layton, then close the book and not look at the hard questions of why Leo Ryan and all those Americans died?'' But by the time I showed em, they were all dead.. They visited her brother in Ukiah, listened to Mr. Jones's teachingswhich in many ways paralleled those of the Quakers and before long even Mr. Blakey's mother had flown from England to join the People's Temple for a short while. Larry's parole came two years earlier than his previously-scheduled release date of April 2004. He got a job as a student pastor at the Somerset Methodist Church in a poor, predominantly white neighborhood in Indianapolis. Its leader, the Rev. Jim Jones would order more than 900 of his followers to commit suicide. Deep inside me, I still have the demons of shame and guilt.". This is a digitized version of an article from The Timess print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. The daughter of Hugo and Anita Philips, Lisa Philips Layton was born in Germany in 1915 into a family that had engaged in banking for at least 200 years. Their courtship began in the spring of 1941, and theywere married in October. (CHRONICLE PHOTO BY SUSANNA FROHMAN), Restaurant chain slated to close site at Bay Area mall, One of the largest movie theaters in SF to close permanently, Grapevine closed indefinitely due to heavy snow and ice, Plan to bring bullet train from LA to Vegas is underway, 'Zero visibility' conditions: All roads to Tahoe are closed, What it looks like inside Coit Towers former apartment, Graupel falls on Disneyland, shocks guests, Avalanche slams into Tahoe apartment building amid blizzard, Hundreds of thousands of workers have abandoned downtown SF, Tahoe's snowfall totals are on track to break records, Report: Matthew McConaughey has a massive Salesforce paycheck, Popular yet divisive fast food chain coming to this Bay Area town. After spending 18 years in Guyana jails and U.S. federal prisons, Larry Layton, the only man convicted on criminal charges arising from the events of November 18, 1978, was released in April 2002. In a brief and halting speech to the court today, Mr. Layton expressed his regrets to the families of Mr. Ryan and the others who were killed. Your Privacy Choices (Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads). Twelve hours had passed as I lay, teetering on deaths precipice when a light turned on inside me: The simple fact that I knew I was dying was proof that I was, indeed, still alive. Jim Jones, and 912 of his followers died by poison and gunfire in mass killings and suicides. Asserting that the Government wanted to make Mr. Layton a scapegoat for the Jonestown massacre, he said, ''From the State Department point of view, from the U.S. Embassy point of view, the whole matter would be easily resolved if you blamed Larry Layton.'' January 15, 2007. She looks away for a moment, then brightens and starts to talk about a visit she made to Jonestown only a few months ago, accompanied by a crew from the Arts & Entertainment network, which is making a documentary on Peoples Temple. It made no sense that he would be trying to leave Jonestown. They swallowed poison capsules in a suicide attempt and were removed, unconscious, from the train. Larry Layton Net Worth is $14 Million. [23][34], However, the superintendent of student services at Brevard Public Schools declined to use the program, and questioned its effectiveness, claiming that "[w]hile the program is well-organized and well-intentioned, it does not follow the scientific evidence-based research guidelines. "I felt we were doing something that had meaning. Excerpt from UNDAUNTED: Surviving Jonestown, Summoning Courage, and Fighting Back by Jackie Speier, reprinted under a license arrangement originating with Amazon Publishing. The parole examiner said he was deeply troubled that Larry had remained in prison for so long well in excess of the five years recommended by the sentencing judge and noted Larrys exemplary behavior while in federal custody. Larry shot and wounded two people at the Port Kaituma airstrip on 18 November 1978, and he attempted to shoot a third. Mr. Layton, who was arrested at the airstrip, was initially tried in Guyana, a small country on the northern coast of South America, on charges of attempted murder against two cult defectors in the airport ambush. [32] By 2010, Lawton had shipped 10,000 DVDs across the country. Hours after Mr. Ryan and four others were shot to death at the airstrip near Jonestown, which was the headquarters of the cult, the cult's leader, the Rev. Syringes surround one of the vats used to mix up the position drink used in the mass murder at Jonestown. Jones himself sat onstage in a throne beneath a sign that read: Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it. The members sang and danced and, by every appearance, were happy. | AP. In 1996, the family and friends of Larry launched a campaign for a presidential commutation. [28], After release he went to Palm Bay, Florida and started LL Research and Consulting and met a business partner. It was utter pandemonium. On November 17, we landed at the tiny airstrip at Port Kaituma. They were issued four T-shirts, four pairs of socks, a toothbrush and toothpaste, four pairs of underwear and a bar of soap. By Robert Lindsey Special to The New York Times. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. [15][18] Local police believed there was a connection between this robbery and a robbery that took place in May 1994 in Daytona Beach, and contacted the FBI. His father was a research scientist. He'd work you so hard you didn't have time to complain, and he'd blackmail you; he destroyed marriages and humiliated you.. Mini Biography. Congressman Ryans body was probably 15 feet away. Jones became enamoured with Carolyn Layton and told Larry he wanted her for his own. Jones then gave Layton permission to remarry a woman named Karen Tow. But the moment I looked down at my own body is locked in my mind. Layton said the temple started out as a civil rights movement and he compared Jones to Martin Luther King Jr., but 'obviously things turned out differently,' he said. According to trial testimony, as the attack began, Layton pulled a gun inside the plane and wounded two temple defectors. [8] In 1983, having earned his GED, he left the Coast Guard and began engaging in criminal activity, mostly loan sharking and bookmaking. [42][13], Lawton has made many media appearances. I was even unaffected by the rice weevils and other strange bugs we ingested daily.". I'm so desperately tired. In the mid and late 1960's, when Berkeley became the scene of frequently tumultuous antiwar demonstrations and other protests, Larry and Deborah Layton joined many of the demonstrations and began experimenting with drugs. 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. In 1972, Mr. Jones married Deborah Layton and Philip Blakey. ''I submit they were presented to inflame you, to arouse your passions, to prejudice you. In June, she filed an affidavit with the State Department detailing the horrors in Jonestown, but got no response. Left-right: Jim Schollaert, Jackie Speier and Congressman Leo Ryan. When people refer to the Jonestown massacre as a mass suicide, I am enraged. Anyone can read what you share. Closing the Book on Case. Mr. Layton was also sentenced to three concurrent terms of 15 years each in related charges of conspiring to kill Mr. Ryan and in the attempted murder of a United States diplomat in the same incident. Mrs. Layton was convinced the man had been cured by Mr. Jones, who is known to have faked such cures by presenting chicken and cattle entrails as cancerous tissue he claimed to have removed. Not long after she left, her parents were rounded up with other Jews and placed on a train to a death camp. That was the last moment I remember with any real clarity before I surrendered my body to the medical staff. 1998-11-02 04:00:00 PDT CALIFORNIA -- For a young woman of 17, flinging herself on the world after the cloistered atmosphere of an English boarding school, Peoples Temple seemed daring and exciting. He is also charged with conspiring to harm Richard Dwyer, a United States diplomat who was wounded in the ambush. In 1978, I went to Guyana on a fact-finding mission. ', "O.J. In May 1978, she was sent by Jones to Georgetown to chaperone some Temple children on a cultural exchange. With Joness wild gaze on us, I tape-recorded affidavits of their wishes to return to the United States. Don put it in his pocket and took a few more steps before carefully unfolding it. Nevertheless, in 1991, a parole board ruled that Larry would have to serve 20 years, and set his release date for 2006. Officers & convicted felon give 'real talk' to Havelock Middle School students", "Real-Life Jewel Thief Breaks Down Inaccuracies of GTA 5's Jewelry Heist Mission", "Was ein Ex-Hftling zu "Prison Architect" zu sagen hat", Former Jewel Thief Reviews Famous Heist Movies, From Oceans Eleven to Heat, Posey Presents Reality Check Community Champion Award to Thomas Reed of Rockledge, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Larry_Lawton&oldid=1140595137, Prisoners and detainees of the United States federal government, Short description is different from Wikidata, All Wikipedia articles written in American English, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 20 February 2023, at 20:41. In 1970, as chairman of a committee overseeing prison reform, he assumed a pseudonym and had himself booked, strip-searched and incarcerated for 10 days at Folsom State Prison, revealing his identity only when it was time to be released. Later, after being barred from the university as a Jew, Lisa took training as physical therapist, which was permitted by the Nazis. All of those children. The docket for Laytons trial through its various appeals through 1990 is here. [39] Other issues he is concerned with include prison conditions as well as post-release debt loads and their influence on unemployed ex-convicts. ''The story of Jonestown is really the story of a world gone mad. Initially she was allowed to recuperate in a cabin of her own, but later she was moved into a crowded dormitorystyle cabin with other elderly women. 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. View Source Suggest Edits Memorial Photos Flowers Created by: Mike Added: 6 Apr 2021 Charismatic and tall with salt-and-pepper hair, he commanded a room. The child talked her out of it. It was an implausible ending for the fiery preacher, who had curried favor among the fashionable elite of the Democratic Party. I would never have left Jonestown with Congressman Ryan. 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. Mr. Jones, they said, could cure cancer. . A bone shot out of my right arm, and a huge hunk of flesh had been blown off my thigh. None of those red flags made the congressman reconsider. But Layton, saying he wishes he could ease the pain. I admired Ryans worthy missions, but questioned if I shared his bottomless capacity to bear witness. It did not sit well with me. Almost immediately, Jones ordered Layton to Jonestown. His family, too, had had great wealth. At the pavilion for breakfast, I did my best to appear unruffled. "[10], While in prison in 2003, Lawton was sent to solitary confinement for 27 days as punishment. Ive shared my Guyana story countless times, but its still a challenge to go back and relive those days. [7] In grades one through six, Lawton served as an altar boy at St. Francis de Chantal in The Bronx,[8] where he was sexually abused by a Catholic priest. At the compound, Don wandered off to smoke a cigarette. At Penn State, still barely able to speak English, she met Laurence Layton, who was studying for a doctorate in biochemistry and needed a tutor in German. We split up, as Jones had arranged. As a temple member, Mrs. Layton separated from her husband and was said to have contributed $250,000 in family assets to the cult. Of the more than 900 members of Joness congregation who had moved there, nearly a third were children. "I was ready to be overwhelmed by emotion," she says, "but when we got into the area, it just wasn't there. The other, Carolyn, became one of Mr. Jones's mistresses and also his principal fnancial adviser; it is not known whether she is alive. I noticed an elderly woman stuffing pieces of bacon into her pockets; the ample spread was just another showpiece. The early release culminated a six-year campaign during which members of his family worked with a core of supporters, first to petition then-President Clinton to commute Larrys sentence, then to convince the Parole Commission to modify its earlier decision on a release date. Peoples Temple leader Jim Jones (left) shakes hands with San Francisco Mayor George Moscone (right) after being sworn in to serve on the San Francisco Housing Authority, Nov. 24, 1977. [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. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them. [2] The book is published in Italy, France, Australia, Germany, Thailand and United Kingdom. In August 1979, he joined the Coast Guard[9] and took part in the Mariel boatlift. ADDRESSES: Home Berkeley, CA. After a year or so Dr. Layton and his wife heard from Carolyn's father that the couple had been divorced. Individually, their insistence would have been hard to question. He was born in the mountains of West Virginia, between White Sulphur Springs and Charleston, to a. [29][13] The program is four hours long. Layton, Deborah 1953- PERSONAL: Born in 1953, in Tooele, UT; daughter of Laurence Laird and Lisa Layton; married; children: Lauren. Somehow, through the encroaching darkness of my final thoughts, I saw my 87-year-old Grandma Emma. [10] In 2012, Lawton self-published Gangster Redemption, an autobiography co-written with Peter Golenbock. 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. The suit was later dismissed. What an evil thing that Jim Jones did. Oh my God: Its true. John Ford. He told you precisely what was on his mind, no matter who you were or whether or not you wanted to hear it. ''This is a criminal case against Larry Layton,'' he said. We saw an impressive community with dozens of pathways, cabins, a medical center, a little school, and a large pavilion where the members congregated regularly. A man followed him and slipped a folded piece of paper into his hand, then disappeared back into the crowd. | AP/San Francisco Examiner. The hundreds of elderly were told that if they attempted escape, they would be left to die prolonged deaths alone in the depths of the jungle. He had engineered complete authoritycollecting members Social Security and disability checks, and determining when and how his disciples could communicate with their families. There is a sickening recording of Jones coercing his followers that day. 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. The Peoples Temple Agricultural Project, better known by its informal name "Jonestown", was a remote settlement in Guyana established by the Peoples Temple, a U.S.-based cult under the leadership of Jim Jones.Jonestown became internationally infamous when, on November 18, 1978, a total of 909 people died at the settlement, at the nearby airstrip in Port Kaituma, and at a Temple-run building in . NBC news correspondent Don Harris was part of our delegation, and was well versed on the accusations against Jones. Mr. Ryan, three journalists and a cult defector were killed and 11 others were wounded. They recovered and with the help of friends managed to reach Italy, later coming to the United States. We accompanied Assemblyman Ryan to shopping centers and campaign events to pass out pamphlets and speak with voters. Onboard, every bump we hit shot an arrow of pain through my body. 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. Elin Cederroos: Ocean Resort Casino, Atlantic City, New Jersey, USA. Larry Layton, who posed as a defector, was captured after badly wounding two people inside a plane trying to take off. [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. And he assigned two of his staff members to come along: Jim Schollaert and me. Moved there, nearly a third were children # x27 ; s parole came two earlier. 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