A new Apple+ docu-series titled John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial includes new eyewitness accounts that reveal the strange disconnect between killer Mark David Chapman and his brutal act.
“He actually apologized to us,” one bystander reports in the promotional trailer below. “He said: ‘Gee, I’m sorry I ruined your night.’ And I said, ‘You gotta be kidding me. You just ruined your whole life.'”
John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial is set to premiere on Dec. 6, almost 43 years to the day after Chapman killed Lennon on Dec. 8, 1980, outside his apartment at the Dakota building in New York City. The three-part presentation is billed as the “most thoroughly researched examination” of that tragic day, with narration by actor Kiefer Sutherland.
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Chapman pled guilty to officers at the scene and was never tried for the crime. He remains in jail, after being denied parole for the 12th time in 2022. Chapman has said he was seeking fame.
What the Trailer for ‘John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial’
‘John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial’ Offers New Revelations
Among the witnesses interviewed are doorman Jay Hastings, who said he heard Lennon’s final words, and taxi driver Richard Peterson. These accounts, “told for the first time by those who were there,” were paired with previously unseen photos to complete the docu-series.
John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial made use of “extensive Freedom of Information Act requests from the New York City Police Department, the Board of Parole and the District Attorney’s office” in order to obtain new material. Lennon’s friends, detectives, prosecutors and Chapman’s defense attorneys were also interviewed.
Chapman’s next appearance before the parole board is set for February.
“I am not going to blame anything else or anybody else for bringing me there,” Chapman told the board last August. “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.”
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Gallery Credit: Nick DeRiso
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