Mark David Chapman – the man who shot and killed John Lennon – will have another parole hearing this week, the New York State Department of Corrections has announced.
According to Reuters and Rolling Stone, the 57-year-old will face his seventh parole hearing since 2000, when the hearings were introduced every two years as part of his sentence. He has been denied parole on each occasion.
Chapman was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 20 years after he pleaded guilty to murdering Lennon on December 8, 1980. He shot Lennon four times in the back outside the former Beatles member’s apartment in New York City, shortly after the musician had signed an album for him.
Rolling Stone reports that a member of the Correctional Association of New York told the Associated Press in 2000: “If Jesus Christ returned to earth for the sole purpose of decreeing that it would be appropriate to release Mark Chapman, the parole board wouldn’t be willing to take the political heat they would get by doing it.”
