The man who shot and killed John Lennon, Mark David Chapman, is up for parole for the seventh time since his imprisonment in 1981 after murdering the Beatles frontman the previous year.
News Ltd reports that Chapman’s hearing is set to begin tomorrow and according to New York State prison service spokeswoman Linda Foglia, is expected to run for two to three days with a decision due “by the end of the week.”
Chapman, now 57 years old, was first sentenced in 1981 for 20-years-to-life for Lennon’s murder, after shooting the cultural icon on December 8, 1980 outside his New York apartment as he was arriving from a walk with his wife Yoko Ono through Central Park.
Chapman, 25 years at the time and who was considered mentally unstable, had stake out the musician’s building and earlier in the day had in fact received an autographed copy of his latest album, Double Fantasy.
Chapman pleaded guilty to the murder and is currently incarcarated at the Wende maximum security prison in Alden, New York.
For the Beatles killer’s last hearing in 2010, Chapman was denied parole as the board deemed his release to be “inappropriate” and said that his “disregard” for human life was a major factor behind his parole rejection.
During his 2010 parole interview, Chapman was quoted as saying of the 1980 incident: “I wasn’t thinking clearly. I made a horrible decision to end another human being’s life, for reasons of selfishness. I felt that by killing John Lennon I would become somebody and instead of that I became a murderer and murderers are not somebodies.”
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Yoko Ono has written several times previous to prison authorities at the Wende facility, opposing the possible release of her husband’s murderer. She has routinely sent the same protest letter every two years since 2000, when Chapman first became eligible for parole.
The decision on Chapman’s seventh parole hearing will be made public by the end of the week.
