AS a fan of both the Beatles and John Lennon I am delighted to learn that Mr Lennon's assassin, Mark David Chapman, has had his most recent application for parole turned down.

However, I can't help thinking that if the murder had taken place in this country, Mr Chapman would have been released ten years since, have taken his case to the European Court of Human Rights (and won, thus suing the Government on the grounds of breaching his civil liberties), written a best-selling book heavily serialised in the News Of The World and would have appeared on Parkinson to tell his story.

It is therefore small consolation that the murder of John Lennon (who would have been 64 on October 9) took place in New York and not here in politically corrupt England.

David L Fairey,

Peterborough Road,

Sheffield.

Updated: 09:18 Friday, October 08, 2004