KEY POINTS:
A man whose South Island home was stormed by armed police this month in search of a missing German woman had previously been charged with criminally harassing a Brazilian student.
Peter Robb, an unemployed 54-year-old from Dunedin, had stun grenades hurled through his kitchen window as police searched for the German woman whom he had met over the internet.
Maja Gille, 36, had texted an acquaintance pleading for help after a week in Robb's company.
Gille, who describes herself as a drama teacher, musician, mother-of-one and part-time social worker, is believed to be the daughter of German Sighard Gille, 68, a prestigious artist.
She left New Zealand last Wednesday after police raided Robb's home a fortnight ago, after being alerted to her plight.
She told police her relationship with Robb - whom she contacted via social networking website MySpace last October - went sour on meeting face-to-face, after months of exchanging photographs and love poems.
The Herald on Sunday has learned that Robb had been before the Dunedin District Court in 2007, on a charge of criminally harassing a Brazilian student.
Last August, he received diversion. The 2007 complaint arose while Robb and the girl - the daughter of a prominent Brazilian business man - were design students at the University of Otago.
He was excluded from the university for three months after the complaint. Police confirmed they had previously confiscated firearms from his home.
The University of Otago would not comment on the incident, but confirmed Robb was a student there.
Robb, who has no phone, did not want to comment either, despite days of email communication with the Herald on Sunday.
"Reading between the lines, I don't like the look of the spin generating on this," he wrote.
"What aim are you trying to achieve here for your readership?"
Last week, Gille said she became concerned when she first met Robb who, she said, greeted her in an overfriendly way at the airport. She claimed he misrepresented himself as a 33-year-old PhD student with photographs that made him look 20 years younger.
"He had such a creepy aura," she told the Otago Daily Times.
"I was in shock. His home was really a horror house, I would say. Little roosters, cats and chickens lived in the house. There was a lot of cartons and dust and rubbish. You could not walk up the stairs and there was an ugly smell, a dead animal smell, and an ugly smell [of] old clothes."
Detective Senior Sergeant Steve McGregor said charges were unlikely, but police would keep tabs on Robb.
In emails last week, Robb said he merely wanted to show New Zealand to the woman with whom he had become romantically involved.
"There was no internet date from hell," he said.
"She was under no delusions or illusions about my appearance.
She knew I was older than 33.
"She merely left messages on my web page complimenting me on our country and called me 'bro'. I emailed her and our love affair started there. She asked for my physical address and sent letters, love poems, cards and lovely presents. I responded in kind. There were also raunchy chat sessions."
He said the police had an "axe to grind" over "corruption in the past", which is why stun grenades smashed through his kitchen window and police bashed down the garage and back door last Saturday.
Police were waiting when the pair arrived home from a trip to Kaikoura about midnight. Gille told them she could not escape Robb because he watched her every move, wouldn't allow her to leave the house with her passport and listened to her phone calls.
But Robb feels wronged by the woman he thought would make a perfect wife.
"The house of horror was a bachelor's pad and I did offer her other accommodation but she wanted to stay [and sleep] with me," he said.
"I am bewildered by events of Saturday and Sunday morning. Maja came here specifically to stay with me and was a free agent at all times. There was never any threat to her at any time.
"She was such a lovely charming person who enchanted all who met her," he added.
"I miss her and want her back, but I know she has a loving family in Leipzig and full-time theatre work."
