John Lennon Murderer Mark David Chapman Denied Parole for 11th Time After Board Determines Release “Incompatible with the Welfare and Safety of Society”

Convicted murderer Mark David Chapman has been denied parole for the 11th time, after the parole board determined that Chapman’s release was “incompatible with the welfare and safety of society.” The board also expressed concern that his release may provoke vigilante justice “out of anger and or revenge” for his 1980 killing of singer-songwriter and Beatles founder John Lennon.

Chapman has been incarcerated since 1980, after pleading guilty to murdering Lennon on December 8 1980. He was given a 20 years-to-life sentence for his crime and has been eligible for parole since the year 2000. His most recent request for parole back in 2018 was also denied on the same basis.

“While no one person’s life is any more valuable than another’s life, the fact that you chose someone who was not only a world-renown person and beloved by millions, regardless of pain and suffering you would cause to his family, friends, and so many others, you demonstrated a callous disregard for the sanctity of human life and the pain and suffering of others,” the board stated back in 2018.

Lennon’s widow, Yoko Ono, has explicitly denied the request to parole Chapman in 2010, which came four years after her public statement saying that she was not ready to forgive him.

The circumstances surrounding Lennon’s death have been well recorded as Chapman, who was identified as a paranoid schizophrenic by five out of six defense experts, was allegedly obsessed with the novel Catcher in The Rye and was even caught with the book at the time of his arrest. This murder was also notable, as the last photo ever taken of Lennon while he was alive was done so by Paul Goresh, who captured the musician signing Chapman’s copy of Double Fantasy.