Ryan Son Claims Execution Plotted

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- The ambush of Rep. Leo Ryan at the Port Kaituma airstrip in Guyana was a "planned execution," one of Ryan's sons said [ ] referring to an [ ] report in the San Francisco Chronicle

"We were concerned about news reports quoting Peoples Temple members as saying the attack was a casual, spur-of-the-moment thing," said Christopher Ryan, one of the California congressman's five children.

"We believe the attack was a planned execution. We believe that the nature and extent of my father's wounds show he was targeted for death," Ryan told a correspondent for the newspaper's Washington bureau.

The very description of "silent" assassins defies credulity had the shooters been from Jonestown. If that were true, it would have been an ad hoc group of enraged young men shouting and yelling, and barking commands at each other, in a chaotic and untrained fashion. Indeed, one of the Ryan children, Christopher, complained to the San Francisco Chronicle, " ‘We were concerned about news reports quoting Peoples Temple members as saying the attack was a casual, spur-of-the-moment thing… We believe the attack was a planned exectution. We believe that the nature and extent of my father’s wounds show he was targeted for death.’ "

"UN-SILENT NIGHT"

A Reconstruction of the Events of November 18, 1978

At Jonestown, Guyana

Inquest: Jones Was 'Murdered'