The notorious Liverpool bodybuilder, Akinwale Arobieke, popularly known as “Purple Aki,” has been found dead at his home in Toxteth at the age of 64.
Merseyside Police confirmed on Wednesday that Arobieke was discovered unresponsive at his residence on Devonshire Road on Tuesday night. He was pronounced dead at the scene. His death is not being treated as suspicious, and a file has been passed to the coroner.
Arobieke, whose name became synonymous with fear across Merseyside and beyond, built a reputation in the 1980s as an almost mythical bogeyman figure. Known for his obsession with young men’s muscles, he developed a pattern of approaching boys and men to touch or measure their biceps — a fixation that earned him notoriety and repeated stints in prison.
Over three decades, he appeared in court numerous times for harassment and intimidation, with judges branding his behaviour “strange and obsessive.” At one point, he was even subjected to a segxwal Offences Prevention Order that banned him from touching men’s muscles or entering gyms.
Despite this, Arobieke always maintained that his actions were not segxwally motivated, insisting he had been unfairly vilified. His reputation grew into folklore, with stories about him spreading across gyms, rugby clubs, and eventually the internet, where he became both a figure of fear and dark humour.
His infamy was tragically linked to the 1986 death of 16-year-old Gary Kelly, who died after being electrocuted on a railway line while allegedly fleeing from Arobieke. Although Arobieke was initially convicted of manslaughter, the conviction was later overturned on appeal.
