3 04-23-87 05:05 ped Layton seeks third murder-conspiracy trial By PAMELA A. MacLEA

   3 04-23-87 05:05 ped

   Layton  seeks  third  murder-conspiracy  trial  By  PAMELA  A.
MacLEAN

   SAN FRANCISCO (UPI) _ Former  Attorney  General  Ramsey  Clark
said  Thursday  former  Peoples  Temple  gunman  Larry Layton was
denied a fair trial in the 1978 conspiracy killing of Rep.    Leo
Ryan.

   The defense team would have to "go all the way" and provide as
aggressive  a  defense  as possible if they had known the penalty
was a mandatory life sentence, Clark testified in  U.S.  District
Court.

   Failure  of  the  defense  to realize that one of four charges
against  Layton  carried  a  mandatory  life   term   constituted
ineffective assistance of counsel, Clark told U.S. District Judge
Robert Peckham.

   Layton,  41,  is  seeking  a  third  murder-conspiracy  trial,
contending the defense in his trial was flawed.

   Clark said the defense had an absolute  duty  to  put  on  the
insanity  defense  unless  it  believed the government had such a
weak case.  The failure to put  on  the  insanity  defense  would
constitute ineffective legal representation, he said.

   Layton,  41,  was  convicted  Dec.  1  in  his second trial of
conspiring to murder Rep.  Leo Ryan, D-Calif., and U.S.  diplomat
Richard  Dwyer  in an ambush at a Guyana jungle airstrip near the
Peoples Temple compound in Jonestown.  His first trial, in  1981,
ended with a jury deadlocked on an 11-1 vote for acquittal on the
conspiracy charge.

   Dwyer  survived,  but  Ryan,  three  journalists  and  a  cult
defector  died  in  the  attack  on  Nov.  18,  1978,  after   an
investigative tour  of  the  camp.  Cult leader Jim Jones and 912
followers died that same  day  in  a  mass  murder-suicide  after
drinking a cyanide-laced soft drink.

   New  revelations  during the hearing have confirmed government
suspicians that Layton not only participated in the conspiracy to
kill Ryan, but that he may have instigated the attack,  according
to U.S. Attorney Joseph Russoniello.

   The  damning  disclosures  this  week could come back to haunt
Layton.

   Although  the  information  released  in  taped  conversations
between  Layton  and  a defense psychiatrist in 1979 could not be
used if a new trial is granted, it could  be  considered  by  the
federal  parole board if he loses and must serve his prison term,
Russoniello said.

   Robert Bryan, Layton's new defense lawyer, has  been  required
to  turn  over  all  previously  secret defense strategy reports,
psychiatric data and notes to  the  government  in  pursuing  his
claim that the defense failed to adequately represent Layton.

   Included  in  the disclosures was a 1979 psychiatric report by
Dr.  Hardet Sukhedeo, in which Layton  said  he  asked  Jones  to
allow  him  to  blow  up  the  plane expected to take Ryan out of
Jonestown.

   "We learned what we had suspected, that he operated of his own
free will and not just as a participant, but as  an  instigator,"
Russoniello said prior to the start of Thursday's session.

   Layton  purportedly  told  Sukhedeo he feared temple defectors
would destroy the church if they left with Ryan.  He  offered  to
use dynamite to stop the plane and when Jones refused, he offered
to  use a gun. s That was at first refused, but later a woman who
died at Jonestown told Layton he could go ahead with his  attack,
according   to   the   tape  recordings  of  the  Sukhedeo-Layton
conversations.

   "I am at a loss to  explain  why  the  defense  opened  this,"
Russoniello said.

   Russoniello  said  the  government never knew what was said by
Layton to Sukhedeo.

   The government also learned in testimony  by  Layton's  former
lawyer,  Tony  Tamburello, that Layton lied to psychiatrists when
he said he was taking drugs, tranquilizers  on  the  day  of  the
killings.

   Layton  was sentenced to life in prison, but was made eligible
for parole in four years.   Some  legal  experts  have  suggested
there  is little liklihood a parole board would release Layton in
less than 10 years _ the minimum usual  time  in  federal  murder
cases.

   "All of  this  is public.  It can be considered (by the parole
board).  It raises serious questions about the  adequacy  of  the
counsel he has now got," Russoniello said.

   Tamburello  testified that Layton's role in the conspiracy and
what he called the "minefield" faced by  the  defense  if  Layton
testified,  convinced  him  and other members of the defense team
not to put their client on the stand.