Sources

Open Questions

Timeline

A question mark after a time indicates uncertainty whether the event happened before or after the preceding/subsequent events.

0800? Taking his 3 daughters out of school for a "picnic", Julius Evans in a group of 9 defectors slip out of JT to walk to Matthews Ridge. The group includes Leslie Wagner-Wilson, wife of JT security chief Joe Wilson, who for much of the day searches JT for his missing wife and infant son. In the jungle they are joined by 2 other defectors, including security guard Robert Paul. Paul's wife and Wagner's sister would become the first two to take poison, also each poisoning her own 1-yr-old child.

0830 Ed Crenshaw drives Herb Newell and Cliff Gieg to Port Kaituma to take the Cudjoe to Kumaka to pick up supplies. Crenshaw says to Herb Newell "by the time we returned the next day, he [Ed] and the others would be dead". [Inquest79]

1030 [1030: Reiterman FBI78] [1030: Hall87] [1030: Scheer11] [1000-1100: Mac22] [1130: Mike Carter FBI78] Journalists and relatives return to JT from Port Kaituma via PT truck.

1100 [1100: Hall87] Gosney and Bagby approach Dwyer about leaving JT.

1100 [1100: Guinn18] Marceline begins JT tour for journalists: medical clinic, nursery, youth dance group, Pittmann Gardens.

1200 [1200 Hall87] Ryan records oral statements by "people who intended to leave" incl. Bagby [Hall87]

1200 [early afternoon: Hall87] [around noon: Mac22] ["by approximately noon, several members of the Parks family...": Dwyer78]  Edith Parks approaches Don Harris asking to leave, and he informs Speier.

1230 Edith, Patty, Brenda Parks and Chris O'Neal tell Speier they wish to leave, as JJ enters pavilion. JJ confers with these 4 defectors and Dwyer.

1230 Tommy Bogue sees Edith Parks defecting, and alerts the Bogue and Simon families.
 
1240 [1330 Mike Carter Inquest79] Dwyer via JT radio orders an extra plane. On tape Q1289 we hear Dwyer ask for an extra plane to carry "about six people" who want to leave. The Ryan party is 20mins from leaving on the 1hr trip to the airstrip on time for their 2pm departure.

 1300? Harris interviews Cobb family, then interviews Maria and Steve Katsaris.

1315? JJ confers with entire Parks family in pavilion. Nearby are Ryan, Dwyer, Lane, Garry, Carolyn and other JT leaders.
 
1315? [20-30mins after previous message: Mike Carter Inquest79] Dwyer via JT radio counts defectors: 2 (Gosney, Bagby) plus a family of 7 (Parks)

1325? Harris interviews Houston family, Oliver family.

1330 Don Harris interviews JJ, confronts him with Gosney note.

1345? Rain starts in JT.

1400 [1330-1400: Mac22] Bogues ask to leave, confer with JJ in pavilion.

1415 [1hr after previous message: Mike Carter Inquest79] Dwyer via JT radio announces 12 more defectors (6 Bogues and 6 Simons, though Bonnie Simon bitterly opposed leaving).

1420 [1530: Mac22] Parks family, Gosney, Bagby walk to truck as Marceline pages Bonnie Simon. Al Simon takes his 3 kids and dad toward the truck, but Bonnie's protest keeps the kids in JT. Al and his dad choose to stay with the kids.

1430 [1430: Scheer11] [1400: Cobb FBI78] Bogue family walks to dump truck, joining the journalists and other defectors. The truck starts to depart, but (deliberately?) gets stuck.

1440 [1500: Reiterman FBI78] Don Sly attacks Rep. Ryan with a knife.

1450 [1330-1400: Rhodes Inquest79] [1400: Clayton Inquest79] [1515: Moore85] [1530-1545: Raven82] [1600: Prokes Inquest79] Shooters Larry Layton and Wes Breidenbach board truck as it leaves, driven by shooter Ed Crenshaw. PT residents cheer when told by JJ that Ryan and the defectors "weren't going anywhere". [Odell Rhodes quoted by Brenda Parks FBI78]

1500 Tractor-trailer of shooters presumably leaves shortly after the dump truck leaves.

1515 Prokes: "After [Ryan truck] left, Maria Katsaris came rushing up to me telling me that a bunch of settlers [had] gone to get Ryan and the situation is out of control and asked me to go down to her home and wait." [Inquest78]

1530 [45min after departing: Hall87] Defector truck reaches JT gate. Shooter Joe Wilson boards truck, rides it to airstrip.

1530 [1500-1600: Guinn18] JJ tells Jimmy Jones in Georgetown via radio to "meet Mr. Frazier" (mass suicide). Jimmy dispatches someone (Laura Kohl?) to retrieve his brothers and the rest of the basketball team from a movie theater. (Stephen reports hearing such a JJ radio order below, so JJ perhaps made multiple such radio calls.)

1600 [1545-1600: Mike Carter Inquest79] [1530: Hall87] Marceline PA announcement: everything fine, go home and stay there. Maria Katsaris has Mike Carter tell Georgetown of a (fake) generator problem, then takes a radio part to disable it. Carter remains in the radio room for 45 more mins, until the meeting is called.

1630 [about 1530: Dwyer78] [1615: Guinn18] [1630: Raven82] [1630: Annib78] [1630: Hall87] [1630: Feinsod81] Defectors arrive at Kaituma airstrip. Dump truck drives Dwyer and Annibourne to Port Kaituma.

1645 [15min after arriving: Scheer11] Cessna and then Twin Otter arrive at airstrip. JT tractor-trailer passes through Port Kaituma on its way to the airstrip, and the dump truck follows it, abandoning Dwyer and Annibourne at Port Kaituma.

1700 Sharon Amos sends Laura Kohl to fetch PT basketball team from practice. [Kohl10] (But cf. Guinn18 above on fetching team from movie theater.)

1700? ["earlier" before 1800: Raven82] Stephen Jones over Lamaha Gardens radio hears JJ order revenge/suicide. Paula Adams and Debbie Touchette advise that such orders have always been canceled in the past.

1700 Dwyer and Annibourne return to airstrip in borrowed truck with District Officer Thomas, truck owner and local businessman Jeffrey Semple, his 2 small children, and a constable with shotgun. [Dwyer78]

1700 [around 1600: Guinn18] [1700: Scheer11] [30min after Marceline stand-down: Rhodes, Clayton Inquest79] PA summons all PT members to the pavilion. Lane and Garry meet at school near pavilion with JJ, Marceline, Beam, McElvane, Katsaris, Johnny Jones, Harriet Tropp. [Lane80] Summons was by JJ himself, who also announced security would check every building. [Rhodes Inquest79] (Guinn18 says Lew Jones made the announcement.) Tim Carter carries son Malcolm toward pavilion while wife Gloria fetches more diapers. [Guinn18]

1700 [1700 Raven82] Mike Carter sends Morse code to SF: Carolyn wants to tell Sandy Bradshaw something. [Moore85] says this was last communication to SF from JT.

? Tom Adams turns off the ham radio in SF to prevent further revenge/suicide orders.

 1705 [1745: Hall87] Katsaris says something privately to JJ, who dispatches Lew Jones to take Lane and Garry to be guarded at East House by Don Sly. [Lane80]

1705 Shirley Smith (30) dances crazily on pavilion stage, shouting about being a "freedom fighter".

1710 Tim Carter carrying son Malcom approaches JJ pow-wow but JJ angrily brushes him off. [Lane80] [Guinn18] Carter overhears Dick Tropp argue to JJ against suicide, and JJ ask Katsaris if there is any way to make the poison taste less bitter. [Guinn18]
 
1710 [1645-1700: Raven82] [1700: Annib78] [1700: Hall87] [1700: Fiensod81] [1750: Astil Paul - Witness:JT] Airstrip assassins open fire, killing Ryan, Harris, Brown, Robinson, Patty Parks. Larry Layton opens fire in the Cessna, wounding Gosney and Bagby. Raven82 says that "around 5pm", the Otter's pilot was in radio contact with Timehri airport in Georgetown during the shooting.

1715 Tim Carter approaches JJ and offers to leave JT with his wife and son and go kill Tim Stoen. JJ replies that Carter would have to "take care of" his son first. Katsaris approaches Tim and Mike Carter near the monkey cage about helping Prokes carry 3 suitcases of money to Soviet embassy. She leads them to a room near the radio shack, and waits for Katsaris to go clear the plan with JJ. [Inquest79][Guinn18]

1715 Airstrip shooters head back to JT, leaving Larry Layton in defectors' custody. Pilot(s) at airstrip radio word of the shooting to Georgetown?

1715 [shortly after 5pm Scheer11] Katsaris radios revenge orders to Georgetown: "A lot of people have seen Mr. Fraser. I think Mrs. Brownfield has offered to help ... get S.B. to help.” [Sandy Bradshaw was radio operator in SF PT.] U.S. Consul Ellice monitors this traffic and later calls Ambassador Burke to alert him.

1715 DT01m [10-15min after summons: Rhodes Inquest79] [1700: Fiensod81] JJ joins meeting at pavilion, ringed by nearly 50 guards armed with crossbows and guns. JJ: "they are in pursuit right now to kill them". JJ has foreknowledge that Larry Layton and the Red Brigade are both going to attack the departing visitors.

1720? The Otter pilot takes off in the Cessna with both planes' aircrew and injured Bagby. Dwyer tries to get the plane to stop, but the pilot points backwards toward the injured Bagby. Pilot's hand signal makes Dwyer think shooters are returning. [Dwyer78] Dwyer's shouted warning sends survivors fleeing to the jungle. Tommy (17) & Teena (23) Bogue, Tracy & Brenda Parks, and Chris O'Neal will be lost for nearly 3 days.

1720 DT05m Christine Miller begins debating suicide. JJ says that it's too late because the hit squad has "started too kill".

1725 [1730 Scheer11] [1700 to 1730 Clayton Inquest79] Larry Schacht and Joyce Touchette retrieve steel drum and Flavor-Aid from kitchen. Lew Jones tells kitchen crew to report to the pavilion.

1800 [approximately 1800: Raven82] Amos calls Bradshaw in SF: "Some people have gone to see Mrs. Frazier. Others will [too]."

1800 Katsaris returns to Carters with JJ's approval, and sends them to their cottages to change clothes and fetch their suitcases, then to West House, where Prokes and Carolyn Moore were typing financial letters. Also there: Marilee Bogue entertaining John Victor and Kimo; Anne Moore shuffling paperwork. [Guinn18]

1800 DT20m Airstrip shooters return as Christine Miller gives up debate. JJ: "Take Dwyer to the East House". JJ apparently assumed that Dwyer was returning to PT, as he had planned. JJ requests the poison vats via loudspeaker, and 10-15 people brought the poison and syringes. [Rhodes] Security team fetches ammo & ~20 guns from a guard shack near East House. [Lane80, Miller debate about Russia is mentioned in next paragraph.]

1800 DT21m Voice mentions "going to get Ujara" (Don Sly) who was summoned from guarding lawyers Lane and Garry at East House. [Lane80]

1800 Kohl and basketball team return to Lamaha Gardens to find 20 GDF soldiers checking for problems. [Kohl10]

1810 Lane hears JJ on PA: "die with some dignity" (cf. DT36m). [Lane80] Lane and Garry released from East House by Garry "Poncho" Johnson and "Johnson from L.A.". [Lane80] Garry "overheard a man, who appeared to be somewhere nearby, state gruffly, 'Let’s not be divisive', followed by three gunshots". [Scheer11] No gunshots at this time are reported by Clayton, Rhodes, or Carters.

1810 First poisonings: Ruletta Brown Paul (24) went first, poisoning her 18-month-old son Robert Paul Jr and then herself.  Second to poison herself and her 1-yr-old son Deron was "Michelle Wilson" i.e. Michelle Wagner Fitch (24). [Feinsod81]  Ruletta's husband Robert Paul was one of the eleven who had quietly escaped into the jungle that morning. Wagner-Fitch was sister of Leslie Wagner-Wilson, who had also escaped that morning with her own young son. Her husband, security chief and airstrip shooter Joe Wilson, had searched for them much of the day. [But Wagner08 says that Clayton and Rhodes "told me my sister went down fighting". Wagner also believes the FBI is hiding evidence that many at JT died of gunshots.]

1810 DT21m JJ: "Gather in folks, it's easy." First evidence on DT that poisoning has begun.

1810 DT22m JJ: "It's too late. The congressman has been murdered. Red Brigade showed them justice."

1815 Anne Moore in West House tells Tim Carter to go ask Maria Katsaris whether John Stoen and Kimo Layton should go to the pavilion. [Inquest79] Or: Carter volunteers to ask JJ if a PT truck should take the couriers as far as the JT gate. [Guinn18]

1815 Guard Ray Jones (41, white husband of JJ adopted white daughter Agnes) asks Grover Davis (78) "Where do you think you're going?" Davis: "I don't want to die." Jones says "Have a good life" and let him pass. Davis hides in a ditch at the edge of JT.

1815 DT26 Katsaris directs people into lines for the poisoning. Rhodes, a JT teacher, gets up from his seat and starts comforting dying children.

1815 DT26 Katsaris pages Annie McGowan, presumably to get her to sign the financial letters carried by Prokes and the Carters.

1815 DT26 JJ says "Marceline, they've got forty minutes." Is this about finishing all poisoning before the GDF arrives from Matthews Ridge? Or perhaps a deadline for Marceline's sons in Georgetown to begin their revenge and suicide assignments?

1820 Tim Carter goes to the pavilion and sees 10-15 bodies on the ground. [Inquest78]  Carter approaches JJ on stage to ask if a vehicle can carry the couriers to the PT gate. JJ says no, and "Son, I'm sorry it had to end this way." Carter notices his wife Gloria holding their son Malcolm as Sharon Cobb squirts poison into his mouth. Goes to them and embraces his dead son and dying wife. Then goes back to West House for courier mission. [Guinn18]

1826 End of nautical twilight at JT on Nov 18. Sunset was 1738, civil twilight was 1800, and astronomical twilight was 1851. After about 1830, it's too dark to easily walk around or see people.

1830 Tim Carter returns to West House. Telling Carolyn Layton that his son was dead, she replies "we had no other choice". Prokes and Carters leave with the suitcases. [Guinn18]
 
1830? Maria Katsaris makes another radio call to Sharon Amos in Georgetown. She says in code that a lot of people have died ("visit Mr. Fraser"), and that more will be dying: "they're working on it". Orders revenge killings ("Brownfield! Brownfield!") and suicide. Amos says the children "don't have any vehicles" to meet Mr. Fraser. [Q1290] Katsaris replies in code: K-N-I.

1830 GDF soldiers leave Lamaha Gardens. Stephen Jones, Sharon Amos, and some others meet privately. Stephen begins calling SF to countermand any JT orders. Most Lamaha Gardens PT members walked to a PNC talent show a few blocks away. [Kohl10]

1835 DT32 Man mentions "the way the children are laying there now." Still in children phase of poisoning.

1835 Odell Rhodes helps Phyllis Chaiken look for a stethoscope, then hides under the senior citizens building as "it was just about getting dark", staying there 30mins. "I did not see any adult settler refusing to drink poison. When I left there were only a few adults who had taken poison." [Rhodes Inquest79]

1840 DT37 JJ: "Mother, Mother, Mother, please. Lay down your life with your child."  Prokes and Carters hear this in the distance, as do Lane and Garry. (Lane says he then heard "several volleys of shots", but Garry says Lane wildly exaggerated the number of shots heard. Clayton reports no gunfire anywhere near this time.)

1845 DT41 JJ: "Bring [the vat] here so the adults can begin."

1845 [1730 Mike Carter Inquest79] Prokes and the Carters reach banana grove 1km away, out of PA earshot, bury some money. Too dark to read letter to Soviet embassy.

1850 DT42 JJ pauses the Death Tape recording as babies are still crying. No more Nov 18 recording on the remaining 100secs of tape available

1900 [1845 Raven82] [1900 Lane80] Lane and Garry see Prokes and the Carters on the other side of the road carrying two cases on their backs, and hide from them.

1915 [1900-1930: Clayton Inquest79] Pavilion crowd was down to 100-200 still alive.

1930 [30mins after hiding: Rhodes Inquest79] PA announcement for all armed persons (Clayton says 20-25) to go to the radio room. JJ tells the remaining residents to exchange a final embrace. Rhodes leaves hiding spot, runs through bakery, physiotherapy, and cooking into jungle towards JT entrance, and walks toward Port Kaituma. [Inquest79]

 1930 Stephen Jones and other basketball teammates confront Tim Stoen at the Pegasus hotel.

1935 [1845 Raven82] Clayton slips into the jungle past guard Ray Jones, telling him he was going to the school tent to say goodbyes. [Inquest79]

2000 [2100 Raven82] [30-45min after escaping: Inquest79] Clayton in jungle hears a loud cheer from JT.

2045 Sharon Amos kills herself and her 3 kids. [Guinn: "sometime after 7pm"]

2100 Lee Ingram calls twice to SF from Georgetown to cancel White Night. (Could any such calls from Ingram or Stephen have been placed while Amos was alive.)

2100 [2130 Raven82] [1hr after cheer: Inquest79] Clayton in jungle hears 5 shots from JT, silencing the chimp Mr. Muggs and some dogs.

2230 [2245 Raven82] [1-2hr after previous shots: Inquest79] [1hr after previous shots: Scheer11] Clayton while retrieving passport hears a final shot in JT, and leaves.

2300 [about 2300: Dwyer78] Thomas arrives at the taverns to tell Dwyer he has called via radio for a rescue plane.

2330 Clayton reaches house of Guyanese Kelly Foran.

0000 [2330-0030: Rhodes Inquest79] Rhodes reaches Port Kaituma constabulary.

0000 Prokes & Carters arrested at Port Kaituma waterfront by Matarakai Development Authority security guard Paul Adams [Inquest79]. Prokes: "We were going to turn ourselves in, but were seized by a guard."