Netflix Docuseries 'American Apocalypse' Revisits Tragic 1993 Waco Cult Standoff

A little more than 30 years ago, a gun battle between members of a religious cult and agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives erupted at a compound outside of Waco, Texas.

The Feb. 28, 1993, incident led to a 51-day siege that ended when an inferno broke out at the 77-acre property owned by the cult, the Branch Davidians, who were under the sway of their leader, David Koresh.

In total, four federal agents were killed along with more than 80 Branch Davidians, including 25 children and Koresh.

The siege became one of the deadliest law enforcement altercations in American history.

In the wake of the 30th anniversary of the deadly standoff, Netflix has released a new docuseries, Waco: American Apocalypse, premiering on March 22. (An exclusive clip of the docuseries is shown below.)

"Since this story first erupted thirty years ago, it's fascinated the world as an iconic and tragic moment in American history," director and executive producer Tiller Russell said in a press release.

"A prophetic leader with an apocalyptic vision, a fierce debate over the right to bear arms, and testing the constitutional limits of religious freedom—it has powerful and provocative elements that still reverberate today."

The series features footage from inside the FBI Crisis Negotiation Unit, FBI recordings as well as interviews with a FBI Hostage Rescue Team sniper, members of the ATF tactical team involved in the shootout and the FBI Crisis Negotiation Unit Chief.

It also features an extensive interview with Heather Jones, the last child to leave the compound alive.

Jones tells PEOPLE in an email that she chose to be involved in the Netflix series because she "wanted to help people understand the truth about what happened."

"The series gave me an opportunity to provide a genuine account of my experience. So much time has passed, but I feel like people can still learn from this time in history," she says.

Jones was born and raised at Mount Carmel and lived there with her parents, who also grew up at the compound, and her two older brothers. Her mother left two years before the siege. Her brothers survived but her father, David Jones, died.

"Every time I watch or talk about what happened, it's very emotional for me," she adds. "It's like I'm 9-years-old again. But what people should know is that growing up in Mount Carmel, I was a happy kid. At one point, it was an amazing place with such a sense of community and all the things that any kid would love — a swimming pool, dogs, chickens, four wheelers and a garden. Everyone looked out for everyone."

A Charismatic Leader, and Ominous Prophesies

David Koresh, a Houston native whose real name was Vernon Howell, came to Mount Carmel in the early 1980s with a fascination with the Bible that traced back to his boyhood.

By 1987, the high school drop-out had taken over as the leader of the Branch Davidians. Koresh assumed his position in the group following a power struggle with the previous leader's son.

"He made the scriptures harmonize," Clive Doyle, a Branch Davidian, previously told PEOPLE of Koresh. "He made them come alive. I believe the spirit of God spoke through him."

The Branch Davidians in thrall to Koresh included people from the U.S., Canada, Australia and the U.K.

Doyle, an Australian, said Koresh's followers were drawn to him because of the lessons he taught. "Some of them were hard to accept, but they learned that this guy spoke like no other prophet or no other preacher that we'd experienced in our whole lifetime," he said.

Koresh claimed he could talk to God and unlock the Seven Seals in the Bible's Book of Revelation. He prophesied about Jesus Christ's second coming and that one day he and his followers would be attacked by the U.S. government.

"He had preached that forces of evil were coming to get them and they would all be killed in a fiery ending and come back as the chosen, and our actions sort of validated his prophecy among his followers," former FBI negotiator Byron Sage previously told PEOPLE.

It all came to a head on Feb. 28, 1993, when ATF agents raided the Branch Davidian's compound after reports surfaced that Koresh had been sexually abusing minors and stockpiling weapons.

Four ATF agents and six members of the group were killed in the ensuing two-hour gun battle. Koresh sustained a gunshot wound to his side. A 51-day standoff followed.

In the weeks-long stalemate between the Davidians and the government, 52 FBI negotiators had dozens of conversations with Koresh.

"This guy was totally different than anyone that we had faced before, certainly than I ever faced," Sage said about Koresh. "This whole thing was horribly unprecedented as far as the nature and scope, the dynamic and deadliness. The average length of a hostage situation in the United States is usually sometime around six to eight hours. This went for 51 days."

The standoff became daily newspaper and television fodder. News trucks lined the streets and enterprising citizens tried to make a fast buck.

During their impasse, the FBI used a variety of tactics to try to draw out the Branch Davidians from their compound, including blaring music in the middle of the night.

By mid-April, when negotiations with Koresh started to wane, tanks began to move in, ramming the compound, and military tear gas was deployed.

Soon afterward, the property went up in flames.

Some Followers Remain Loyal

The truth of who started the fire on April 19, 1993, became a major point of contention between authorities and the Branch Davidians.

The FBI has maintained that the religious group's followers ignited three fires simultaneously, a finding reportedly agreed upon by outside investigators, though some survivors still point their fingers at federal agents.

Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLE's free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases.

Doyle, who was one of nine people to escape the compound fire while his daughter was killed, said law enforcement tried to pin the fire on him.

"They wanted scapegoats to blame for this incident," he said.

After the inferno swept through, Koresh and 74 other Davidians, including 25 children (some of whom Koresh had fathered), were found dead.

Koresh and some others had suffered fatal gunshot wounds. Sage, the former negotiator, said Koresh was shot once in "the center of his forehead."

"Nobody knows how David died or who administered the coup de gras or anything like that," Sage said. "But I can tell you absolutely without hesitation that it was not us."

Koresh was 33 when he died on April 19, 1993, and his body was found among the rubble at the Mount Carmel compound.

Cult expert Rick Ross previously told PEOPLE that to this day, some of Koresh's followers remain loyal and await his resurrection, believing he was "truly a prophet even though he prophesized that when he died, the world would end and that the world would be judged and that it would be the end of time."

"That did not happen," Ross added. "His prophesies failed repeatedly. But people who sacrificed their families, their lives, for David Koresh have chosen to continue to believe and kind of support each other in this belief in order to move on. The alternative for them is that all their sacrifices were made for nothing."

The docuseries Waco: American Apocalypse premieres on Netflix on Wednesday, March 22.