Murder of John Lennon - Dec 8, 1980

On the evening of December 8, 1980 former Beatle John Lennon was returning from a recording session at the Record Plant in New York City to his home in the Dakota building next to Central Park. After exiting his limo at the street he stopped to sign autographs for a few people waiting on the sidewalk. As he made his way into the building after signing the autographs one of the the people who he'd just given an autograph to opened fire on him with a handgun and hit him with several shots. Lennon, barely alive stumbled into the security guard station of the building and collapsed. He was rushed in the back of a police car to a nearby hospital and was pronouned dead a short time later.

Lennon's death sparked a global outpouring of grief not seen since the Kennedy assasination. Six days after the murder some 250,000 people gathered in Central Park near the Dakota to observe 10 minutes of silent rememberence.

I will not give the murderer the satisfaction of mentioning his name here. He remains to this day an inmate at Attica State Prison in New York and, personally, I hope he rots in hell.