John Lennon’s murderer denied parole for 14th time
The Department of Corrections and Community Supervision has confirmed they denied John Lennon‘s murderer’s latest attempt for parole.
Mark David Chapman, who murdered Lennon outside his apartment in the Dakota Building in New York City in 1980, appeared before a parole board on August 27th, according to the Associated Press.
Hours before he killed Lennon, the former member of The Beatles had signed a copy of his recent album, Double Fantasy, for Chapman outside his apartment. Chapman later returned and murdered the musical icon.
In August 1981, Chapman was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison for the second-degree murder of Lennon. He has been eligible for parole since 2000, but has now been denied his release on 14 occasions.
In 2022, unsealed transcripts leaked from Chapman’s 12th parole hearing. During the court appearance, he claimed that murdering Lennon was his “big answer to everything. I wasn’t going to be a nobody, any more.” He added, I am not going to blame anything else or anybody else for bringing me there.”
Chapman also said, “I knew what I was doing, and I knew it was evil, I knew it was wrong, but I wanted the fame so much that I was willing to give everything and take a human life.”
He admitted to the courtroom: “This was evil in my heart. I wanted to be somebody, and nothing was going to stop that.”
Upon rejecting his parole claim in 2022, the board highlighted his “selfish disregard for human life of global consequence”, and noted how “the world recovering from the void of which you created” by murdering Lennon.
Yoko Ono, who has denied Chapman’s attempts for parole, said in 2020 to the Daily Beast of the senseless act: “It’s very, very difficult for me to think about Chapman. Especially because he doesn’t seem to think that was a bad thing to do one thing I think is that he did it once, he could do it again, to somebody else.”
Chapman’s next parole hearing is set for February 2027.
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