John Newman (Australian politician)
John Paul Newman, born
John Naumenko, (
December 8,
1946 -
September 5,
1994) was a member of the
New South Wales state parliament and Member for the seat of
Cabramatta. He was the first politician to be assassinated in Australia since the 1977 murder of
Griffith councillor
Donald Mackay.
John Newman was the son of
Austrian and
Yugoslav parents, who settled in
Cabramatta when he was a small child. He was educated at Cabramatta Primary School and
Liverpool High School. He went on to work at Borg Warner in
Fairfield. In March
1972 he changed his surname by deed poll to Newman. He had a long history of involvement with the labor movement and with the
Australian Labor Party, spending much of his working life as a
union official. He was a State union organiser with the Federated Clerks Union from 1970 to 1986. Newman completed post-graduate studies in industrial law at the
University of Sydney, and undertook a variety of Trade Union Training Authority education programs.
Newman was elected an alderman on
Fairfield Council in
1977 and remained on the council for 10 years. He was Deputy Mayor in 1985-86 and also served as Acting Mayor in 1986. In December
1979 Newman's pregnant wife, Mary, and five-year-old son, David, were killed in an automobile accident at
Bossley Park.
Following a by-election in the seat of Cabramatta, Newman was elected to Legislative Assembly of
New South Wales on
February 1,
1986. Since the 1970s, Cabramatta has been a centre for immigrants and refugees from Asian backgrounds, particularly
Vietnam,
China,
Laos,
Cambodia,
Thailand and
Korea. For many years Newman had been waging a campaign to break up the Asian crime gangs and corruption that had plagued the area.
He had been the target of numerous death threats from such gangs but did not seek police protection. During the night of
September 5,
1994 while outside his Woods Avenue home, he was shot and killed. His
fiancée, Lucy Wong, was with him at the time but saw little of what happened because of the swiftness of the murder.
A local nightclub owner,
Phuong Ngo, who had previously attempted to secure
Labor Party pre-selection for the seat, was convicted of the killing in 2001. Two of Ngo's associates escaped convictions. In 2003, an appeal by Ngo against the conviction failed.
Newman's death has made him a martyr. This helped the
Australian Labor Party to win back the seat in the
Cabramatta by-election that followed in a landslide. A local
swimming pool has been named after him by the Fairfield City Council.
*
5T
