How Hong Kong reacted to the shooting of John Lennon
The former Beatle’s 1980 murder in New York sent shock waves around the world, not least in Hong Kong, where broadcasters were quick to air tributes
“Man guns down Lennon”, reported the South China Morning Post, following the murder of pop-culture icon John Lennon on December 8, 1980, three years after he had visited Hong Kong as a tourist.
“The most controversial [member] of the Beatles pop group was shot dead as he entered his Manhattan apartment house late last night by a man who calmly called his name before opening fire,” the story continued. “As Lennon’s Japanese wife, Yoko Ono, screamed hysterically, the 40-year-old musician gasped ‘I’m shot,’ staggered up six steps and collapsed, police said. Lennon was dead on arrival at Manhattan’s Roosevelt Hospital, where doctors said he never stood a chance of survival.”
Lennon’s killer, 25-year-old Mark David Chapman, who was described at his trial as a schizophrenic obsessed with J.D. Salinger’s 1951 novel Catcher in the Rye – pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 20 years. He remains in prison.