Role Australian Politician Preceded by Tony Bevan | Nationality Australian Succeeded by Gerry Sullivan Name Frank Arkell Resigned May 3, 1991 | |
 | ||
Full Name Francis Neville Arkell Website NSW Legislative Assembly webpage Died June 26, 1998, Port Kembla, Wollongong, Australia | ||
Political party Independent politician | ||
Francis Neville (Frank) Arkell (13 September 1935 – 26 June 1998) was an Australian politician. Arkell was a long-serving Lord Mayor of Wollongong and an independent member of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly, representing Wollongong. In 1998 Arkell was violently murdered in his home, aged 62 years.
Contents
Early life
Arkell was born in Port Kembla, New South Wales.
Political career
Between 1974 and 1991, Arkell served as Lord Mayor of Wollongong City Council. He was elected as an independent to represent the seat of Wollongong in the New South Wales Parliament from 1984 until his defeat at the 1991 election.
Later life and death
In October 1996, Franca Arena asked in state parliament whether Arkell was the person known to the Wood Royal Commission as W1 in allegations involving paedophilia.
In 1998, seven years after he had left politics, Arkell was murdered at his home in Wollongong by Mark Valera. Arkell's head had been smashed in with a bedside lamp, an electric cord was wrapped tightly around his neck, and from his eyes and cheeks tie-pins protruded. According to a subsequently broadcast media report, a police investigator revealed that, at the time of his death, Arkell was "...facing charges which had not gone to court..."
At his trial, Valera said that he and Arkell had been in a sexual relationship for more than a year. Valera also testified that he had been a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of his own father, Jack Van Krevel, from the age of seven. In August 2000, less than two weeks after Valera was convicted of Arkell's murder, Jack Van Krevel was also murdered.