We’re deep into the third and final episode of the Apple TV+ true crime documentary series “John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial” when one of the detectives who worked the case shares a piece of information he hadn’t previously said in public: that he never read “The Catcher in the Rye,” the book Mark David Chapman had with him on the night Chapman shot and killed John Lennon in front of Lennon’s residence at the Dakota in New York City on Dec. 8, 1980.
All due respect, that’s hardly a bombshell. In fact, even though this well-filmed, journalistically solid and at times moving documentary series includes interviews with witnesses who previously had not spoken on the record and features audio recordings of Chapman we hadn’t heard before, there’s nothing truly earth-shattering here.
In the opening episode, titled, “The Last Day,” narrator Kiefer Sutherland intones, “Incredibly, for a crime of this magnitude, the case never went to trial, so the facts of what happened have never been publicly established. And where there’s darkness, conspiracy theories have grown.” The legendary publicist Elliot Mintz comments on the FBI and CIA putting Lennon under surveillance and claims, “Steps were taken on the highest level to do something about ‘the Lennon problem.’”
It all sounds very juicy and provocative, but we’re never presented with a shred of evidence the government had anything to do with Lennon’s murder, and the “conspiracy theories” Sutherland hints at are essentially reduced to one half-hearted suggestion that Chapman might have been brainwashed by the CIA and was nothing but a patsy who was the victim of mind control.
As for the fact there was no trial, that’s because Chapman meant to plead not guilty by reason of insanity but had a last-second change of heart after he claimed God visited him in his jail cell and told him to plead guilty. We’re left with the same conclusion we’ve had for more than 40 years now: that Mark David Chapman was a sad, deeply troubled and quite likely mentally ill man who acted alone when he killed the 40-year-old Lennon and didn’t even try to escape, instead taking out his copy of “The Catcher and the Rye” and reading it until the cops showed up to arrest him.
That opening episode features interviews with witnesses including Joe Many, a porter at the Dakota; Jay Hastings, who was on duty as a concierge at the building that night, and Richard Peterson, a New York City cabdriver who was taking a fare to the Dakota that night, pulled up just behind the limo dropping John and Yoko Ono home, and watched in horror as Chapman shot Lennon. Each man, now grizzled, but still clearly shaken by events, gets emotional as he recalls his experience. Says Peterson the cabdriver: “He shot him. I thought they were making a movie … but I didn’t see lights or cameras. … This guy was still standing there with a gun.”
That evening, producer Jack Douglas had been working with Lennon on some new music. “He was back in it, completely,” recalls Douglas. “His confidence level was way off the charts. … Everything was going right. He was on top of the world.” Cut to news footage from later that night, with Douglas and his wife trying to gain access to Roosevelt Hospital to be with their friend Yoko. By that time, John Lennon most likely was already pronounced dead.
Episode 2, “The Investigation,” and Episode 3, “The Trial,” shift the focus to the aftermath of the murder that stunned the world, with investigators, attorneys and mental health experts weighing in on their experiences on the case. We hear audio recordings of Chapman making delusional statements, e.g., “I killed myself, I’m John Lennon,” and we’re told Chapman also believed the act of murder would literally transform him into Holden Caulfield, the teenage narrator and main character in “The Catcher in the Rye.” Parallels are drawn to John Hinckley Jr., who was also obsessed with Salinger’s book. Dr. Naomi Goldstein, speaking publicly for the first time about her interactions with Chapman, says: “He showed so many different facades. He could be nasty, he could be sweet. He was difficult.”
Now 68, Mark David Chapman is incarcerated at the Green Haven Correctional Facility in New York. Every two years since 2000, he has been up for parole. A dozen times, he has been denied. “John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial” ultimately serves as a reminder there was no grand conspiracy behind the murder of John Lennon. One man with a gun, seeking fame and consumed with irrational jealousy, ended the life of one of the most influential artists and activists of the 20th century.
