Kym Arkell was sentenced recently for numerous crimes, including a threat to kill a Dollar Tree employee at Country Club Centre. (Nanaimo RCMP)

By Ian Holmes

prolific offender

Man sentenced for threatening to kill Nanaimo retail worker & several other crimes

Jun 6, 2022 | 5:26 AM

NANAIMO — Guilty pleas to five charges resulted in a time-served jail sentence of a little over five months to a Nanaimo man who’s no stranger to police and the judicial system.

Kym Robert Arkell, was released from jail on Thursday, June 2 after a sentencing hearing in provincial court in Nanaimo heard about Arkell’s anti-social behaviour, some of which put the public at risk.

The Crown’s Liam Thomson explained in Oct. 2020 Arkell was confronted by an employee at Dollar Tree at Country Club Centre for allegedly shoplifting.

Arkell removed candy he was concealing and began walking out of the store while hurling verbal abuse toward the intervening employee, Thomson said.

“As he’s walking away he pulls out what ultimately appeared to be a long black flashlight from his sweater and states ‘I have a gun, I’ll shoot you dead.’ it frightens some customers out of the store,” Thompson told court.

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The most recent offence also occurred at Country Club Centre on the afternoon of Feb. 16, 2022, where an erratic Arkell was seen swinging a switchblade outside a loading bay.

Mall security was called and Arkell was arrested on scene without incident.

Surveillance video pinned Arkell to a trio of crimes.

He stole a cashier’s purse from a central Nanaimo gas station in Dec. 2020.

Arkell was viewed igniting a trash bin on fire in the foyer of a Parksville bank a year later.

A May 2021 offence at a Nicol St. motel involved Arkell cutting wires to one of the business’s surveillance cameras.

Arkell’s longtime lawyer James Wright told court significant behavioural and mental health challenges continue plaguing the 38-year-old Arkell.

He noted Arkell benefits from the constant support of his mother and a local social agency, but stated homelessness and drug use are compounding barriers.

Wright said his client is on disability but does have employment possibilities and a place to live with a friend post-release.

Judge Brian Harvey accepted a joint sentence recommendation of 159 days already served in jail and one-year probation.

“What you end up doing is essentially a life sentence in installments and life’s passing you by,” judge Harvey told Arkell in reference to his constant cycle in and out of jail.

Arkell was issued one year of probation, which includes a ban on possessing all forms of weapons.

He was also handed a decade-long firearms ban.

He attended his sentencing hearing virtually from the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre in Saanich and didn’t formally address the court.

Arkell has had numerous convictions on the mid-Island since 2006 for crimes primarily involving violence and property crimes.

He was convicted in a pair of similar life-threatening daytime stand-offs with Nanaimo RCMP at Beban Park occurring months apart in 2017 and 2018 within meters of Altrusa Venture Park playground.

Both incidents involved Arkell threatening to kill the responding Nanaimo RCMP officer with a knife he produced.

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ian@nanaimonewsnow.com

On Twitter: @reporterholmes