Mark David Chapman, 63, was denied parole for the 10th time on Thursday, pictured in a mugshot released Monday

John Lennon's killer was denied parole for the 10th time in a closed-door hearing on Thursday.

Mark David Chapman, 63, gunned down the Beatles star outside of his Manhattan apartment The Dakota on December 8, 1980 with four shots to the back.

Chapman appeared before a three-member panel this week, according to the New York Daily News, but was denied parole. The reason for the denial has not yet been released.

This means he will be imprisoned for another two years until he is eligible for parole again in 2020.

He became eligible for parole in 2000 and has submitted a total of nine applications, all of which have been denied.

He said he shot the beloved singer because of he was envious of his fame and believed the beloved Beatle was a phony.

He is serving a 20-years-to-life in the Wende Correctional Facility in western New York after pleading guilty to a charge of 2nd degree murder.

His mugshot was released in light of his parole application, picturing Chapman for the first time in six years where he looks to have lost weight and his hair has thinned.

The recent mugshot was taken back in January but only released on Monday.

He became eligible for parole in 2000 and has submitted nine applications for parole, but all have been denied, his succession of mugshots pictured above

Chapman killed John Lennon on December 8, 1980 with four shots to the back outside the Beatle's Manhattan apartment The Dakota pictured above

Chapman, pictured escorted out of police station following his 1980 arrest, is serving a 20-years-to-life at Wende Correctional Facility in New York

In his last parole application in 2016, he was rejected because of the 'premeditated and celebrity-seeking nature of the crime'.

In the past the Parole Board has said that releasing Chapman would 'undermine respect for the law'.

He has stated in previous applications that if released, there is a minister who has agreed to take him in and give him a job.

Yoko Ono, Lennon's widow, has declined to comment on the parole denial through her lawyer.

Her lawyer Jonas Herbsman did note that Ono sent the parole board a letter requesting that Chapman remain in prison.

She sent similar letters in previous years when Chapman applied for parole in which she expressed concern for her own safety if he was released, as well as the safety for Lennon's two adult sons Julian and Sean.

She argued that she was also concerned for Chapman's own safety from embittered and revenge-seeking Beatles fans.

The iconic singer was shot in front of his wife Yoko Ono, pictured together above. Ono penned a letter to the parole board upon Chapman's application urging for the killer to remain in jail

Chapman said he killed Lennon because he was angry at his opulent lifestyle and wanted to achieve fame himself

John Lennon is pictured alongside son Sean and wife Yoko Ono in New York in 1977

The parole board has acknowledged that the killer has a clean prison record since 1994. He also claimed to have found Jesus during his time in jail.

He is kept in protective custody against his will at the correctional facility. He also works there as an administrative clerk and is allowed out of his cell a minimum of three hours a day.

At the prison he is registered with the 'family reunion program', permitting him conjugal visits with his wife Gloria Hiroko Chapman, who he married 18 months before the murder, and his stepfather.

Despite his numerous applications for parole, in a previous hearing Chapman stated that he's willing to pay for his murder - 'however long it takes, forever'.

Last week Beatles fans gathered at Strawberry Fields in Central Park, a memorial to Lennon close to the murder scene, to speak out against Chapman's release.

Lennon's fans also gathered in Strawberry Fields, a memorial close to where he was shot, to argue against Chapman's release on August 15

His own family is also praying that he never sees the outside of a jail cell, as his stepsister Linda Walker told Dailymail.com.

Walker says that Chapman's mother Reathy Breteler lives in fear that the killer may go after her out of resentment for his estranged relationship with his late father.

She said that Chapman used to write to his mother regularly in an effort to reach his father, who wanted nothing to do with his twisted killer son. The letters stopped after he died.

'They live in fear of this man and that he could do God knows what to them,' a source close to Breteler said.

'They genuinely are terrified that he could come after them and do what he did again. He's as calculated and cold-blooded a person you could ever meet. They literally see him as the devil and have actually said that by washing their hands of him entirely they are trying to exorcise him out of their lives,' the source added.