John Lennon's killer denied parole for 7th time in New York

Albany, N.Y.: John Lennon's killer was denied release from prison in his seventh appearance before a parole board, said New York corrections officials.

Mark David Chapman, 57, was denied parole by a three-member board after a hearing, the state Department of Corrections said. The transcript of his latest hearing wasn't immediately released.

Chapman can try again for parole in two years. Chapman shot John Lennon in December 1980 outside the Manhattan apartment building where the former Beatle lived. He was sentenced in 1981 to 20 years to life in prison after pleading guilty to second-degree murder. The musician, singer and songwriter was 40.

$John Lennon\'s killer denied parole for 7th time$

Mark David Chapman, 57, was denied release from prison in his seventh appearance by a three-member board.

"Despite your positive efforts while incarcerated, your release at this time would greatly undermine respect for the law and tend to trivialise the tragic loss of life which you caused as a result of this heinous, unprovoked, violent, cold and calculated crime," board member Sally Thompson wrote. Board members Joseph Crangle and Marc Coppola agreed.

The panel praised Chapman's conduct and accomplishments but said "parole shall not be granted for good conduct and program completions alone". The board noted there was significant opposition to his release.

Chapman was transferred in May from the Attica Correctional Facility in western New York to the nearby Wende Correctional Facility. Both are maximum security. The prison system doesn't disclose why inmates are transferred.

At his previous hearing in 2010, Chapman recalled that he had considered shooting Johnny Carson or Elizabeth Taylor instead, and said again that he chose Lennon because the ex-Beatle was more accessible, that his century-old Upper West Side apartment building by Central Park "wasn't quite as cloistered." Chapman fired five shots outside the Dakota apartment house on December 8, 1980, hitting Lennon four times in front of his wife, Yoko Ono, and others.

The former security guard from Hawaii said that his motivation was instant notoriety but that he later realised he made a horrible decision for selfish reasons. "I felt that by killing John Lennon I would become somebody and instead of that I became a murderer and murderers are not somebodies," Chapman told the board two years ago.