John Lennon Murdered 31 Years Ago
Thursday marks the 31st anniversary of rock ‘n’ roll icon John Lennon’d death.
It was 31 years ago that Lennon was shot and killed outside of his Upper Westside Manhattan apartment.
Lennon took four bullets in the back from a fan turned crazed gunman, who waited outside his building for three days.
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United Press International published the autopsy findings of Chief Medical Examiner Elliot Gross the day after the shooting in 1980.
“Lennon was hit with four bullets, two of which entered the left back, passed through the left chest, striking the left lung and exited from the body,” according to the medical report.
The shooter, Mark David Chapman, had received an autograph from Lennon just hours before he murdered him.
Although the motive remains unknown, Chapman was speculated to be mentally unstable.
After the shooting, Chapman waited around the slain rock stars body reading “The Catcher in the Rye” until police arrived on the scene.
Chapman received the maximum sentence of 20 years to life and he remains incarcerated at the Attica Correctional Facility in New York. His parole has been denied six times.
Ironically, Lennon specifically mentioned he didn’t want to be a “dead hero” in his final interview just three days before his death.
“These critics with the illusions they've created about artists, it's like idol worship," Lennon said. "They only like people when they're on their way up. I cannot be on the way up again.”
“What they want is dead heroes, like Sid Vicious and James Dean,” he continued. “I'm not interesting in being a dead hero.”
Lennon and the Beatles transformed rock ‘n’ roll selling more records and topping more worldwide charts than any other band or artist.
Together, Lennon and Paul McCartney wrote more hit songs than any composer in modern history.
