Charles R. Garry (March 17, 1909 – August 16, 1991) was an American civil rights attorney who represented a number of high-profile clients in political cases during the 1960s and 1970s, including Huey P. Newton during his 1968 capital murder trial and the Peoples Temple during the 1978 Jonestown tragedy.

[1] Born in Bridgewater, Massachusetts, to Armenian immigrant parents who had escaped the Hamidian massacres in the Ottoman Empire,[2] Garry grew up in a farm town in California's Central Valley.

[3][4] He worked his way through law school at night at a cleaning shop and was a Great Depression-era socialist who began his legal career defending militant trade unions.

[8] In 1977, amidst media scrutiny and potential litigation, Garry began representing the controversial Peoples Temple, led by Jim Jones,[4] in a number of suits, including several by and against Timothy Stoen.

"[4] After further experience with the Temple, including reviewing the results of several Freedom of Information Act requests, Garry eventually changed his conclusion to the belief that there was little government interest, let alone a conspiracy.

[14] That day, 918 people died in Jonestown and Georgetown, which comprised the greatest single loss of American civilian life in a non-natural disaster until the incidents of September 11, 2001.