While Lane blames Jones and Peoples Temple leadership for the deaths at Jonestown, he also claims that U.S. officials exacerbated the possibility of violence by employing agents provocateur.
Wow, guess what's the next question I'm asking myself?
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While Lane blames Jones and Peoples Temple leadership for the deaths at Jonestown, he also claims that U.S. officials exacerbated the possibility of violence by employing agents provocateur.
chiggerbit wrote:Look, Hugh, I hate to be one who tells you that your hero has feet of clay.
In mid-August of 1978, while Ray and his then lawyer Mark Lane faced TV cameras in public testimony, Blakey sprang a surprise on Ray and Lane, in the form of MLK Exhibit 92. Lane had asked for and been promised a chance to review the committee’s evidence against Ray prior to its being presented. Yet on this hot midday in Washington, DC, Lane and Ray were ambushed with a transcript of an interview with Alexander Anthony Eist, a former member of a unit within Scotland Yard. Eist made some astonishing claims, notably that Ray had not only confessed to killing King but that he had exhibited an intense hatred of blacks.
Lane was furious. Not only had he not been given advance notice so that he could research these charges, but the statements had not even been made under oath. In Murder in Memphis, Lane wrote:
...The unsworn answers given by Eist could have no legal import although they were designed to seem impressive to a waiting television audience. If Blakey and his staff of attorneys and investigators suspected or believed that Eist was not telling the truth the technique they decided to employ, securing remarks which were not given under oath, would spare them the potential embarrassment of prosecution for subornation of perjury. It also permitted Eist to make false statements with the knowledge that he could not be prosecuted for perjury. Blakey had issued a license to lie to Eist....
Sure, let's say for argument's sake that he "didn't realize" how fucking near the edge Jones and all the rest of these poor zombie cult members were.
He at least must have wondered after-the-fact how much he played a part in finally tipping them over the edge and had to deal with the guilt of that. Wouldn't you?
But no, now we have him pushing the old "it was the CIA" meme. Talk about the most colossal opportunism.
BTW, did he ever give us a blow-by-blow account of how it all went down, his impressions, how he managed to get away? I'd like to see it, if you have it. Not that I'd necessarily believe it.
It's ironic, but it looks to me as if Lane and Berlet are two sides of the same coin.
chiggerbit wrote:Lane later wrote a book about the tragedy, The Strongest Poison. [29] Lane reported hearing automatic weapon fire, and presumes that U.S. forces killed Jonestown survivors.[30] While Lane blames Jones and Peoples Temple leadership for the deaths at Jonestown, he also claims that U.S. officials exacerbated the possibility of violence by employing agents provocateur.[30] For example, Lane claimed that Temple attorney (and later defector) Timothy Stoen, who Lane alleged had repeatedly prompted the Temple to take radical action before defecting, "had evidently led three lives", with one being a government informant or agent.[31] Lane's allegations joined those of other conspiracy theorists after the tragedy, including those of the Church of Scientology, John Judge, Jim Hougan[30], Jack Anderson [32] and a trio of Soviet authors.[33]
chiggerbit wrote:http://skepdic.com/cognitivedissonance.html
chiggerbit wrote:Quite frankly, I'm beginning to wonder how deep Scientology is into pushing the bigger conspiracies.
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