Activity 1: Report on Case Study related to Forensic Toxicology.

The Jonestown Massacre

Submitted by: Submitted to:

Name: Tirupati Nayak Ms. Jayashree C. Patel and
USN: 20BSR08089 Mr. Rahul Das
Class: 5FSPB Assistant Professor
Department of Forensic Science
School of Sciences,
JAIN (Deemed-to-be University),
Bangalore.
 Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple

Founded in 1955 by Jim Jones, The Peoples Temple was a racially integrated church that
focused on helping people in need. The church earned a reputation for aiding the cities’
poorest citizens, especially racial minorities, drug addicts, and the homeless.
Jones told his congregations that only socialism brought perfect freedom, justice and equality,
perfect love in all its beauty and holiness.
The increasing media scrutiny based upon allegations by former members placed further
pressure on Jones in 1977. He used this as an excuse for his congregations to move to
Guyana, South America.

This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND

 Jonestown

In 1977, Jones and his followers relocated to Jonestown, located in the remote jungles of
Guyana, South America. The Peoples temple had purchased and began to develop the lad
three years earlier.
Jim Jones had a vision of a socialist community, one in which everyone lived together in
harmony.
The move allowed Jones to have complete control over his followers. Battling an oppressive
tropical climate and limited resources, they began to convert the dense jungle into a working
agricultural commune, soon known as “Jonestown”.
Jonestown had little reason to expect interference from Guyana – a “cooperative republic”
whose government happily ignored signs of the cult’s authoritarian and paranoid bent. Back
in the US, however, parents of Jonestown inhabitants – concerned by the strange letters, or
lack of letters, they received from their children – had been lobbying the government to
investigate.