Death of a Beatle: Lennon gunned down in New York

Mark David Chapman, 25, murdered the 40-year-old music icon outside his home

- Agencies

John Lennon, the founder and driving force behind The Beatles, was shot dead late on the evening of December 8 by a lone gunman as he returned to his home on New York's West Side with his wife, Yoko Ono.

The 40-year-old British musician was rushed to Roosevelt Hospital but was dead on arrival. Police said 25-year-old Mark David Chapman of Honolulu, Hawaii, had been arrested on a charge of murder. Officers at the spot later said they saw him sitting at the scene reading a copy of JD Salinger's Catcher in The Rye. Chapman would later claim he was deeply influenced by the coming-of-age novel and that he saw shades of its protagonist Holden Caulfield in himself.

A police spokesman said the gunman had got Lennon's autograph earlier in the evening as the former Beatle, wearing jeans and a red shirt, and Yoko, left their home in the Dakota, a luxury apartment block near Central Park.