Police say that, after being charged under the Harmful Digital Communications Act, Ms Z was given bail but had to adhere to strict conditions, which included not contacting the detective.
This “frustrated the complainant”, who then set about scouring social media for information about the police officer’s wife in a bid to “circumvent this ban”.
Ms Z also found an “embarrassing” photo of the detective’s wife holding a beer bong on Facebook from years earlier, then set up a fake email account and contacted the woman.
She found details of her employer and job title and started sending emails to her work address, copying in senior police officers, the Lower Hutt mayor and a journalist.
The emails referred to the complainant’s young children, the police summary says.
“This included making highly offensive sexual references about the children and suggesting they should be sexually abused,” the summary says.
The summary shows some of the emails were sent in quick succession over the space of three days last year.
Ten were sent in the space of 51 minutes on June 29, 2025.Nine were sent in the space of 32 minutes on June 30, 2025.Fifty-six of the 87 emails were sent on July 2, 2025.
It says the emails caused “serious emotional stress, embarrassment, and anxiety for both the complainant and her husband”.
“This impacted both their personal and professional lives,” the summary says.
After being charged over contacting the detective’s wife, Ms Z then again attempted to circumvent a court-ordered ban and was charged again.
When ordered not to contact the detective’s wife, the summary says she started emailing the CEO of the woman’s employer.
Last month the Herald revealed Ms Z requested money from McSkimming for sex acts that had occurred between the pair, urging him to “pay up and this will end”.
In response to that story, Ms Z told the Herald: “I accept not every step I took in raising my concerns was the right one.”
Michael Morrah is a senior investigative reporter/team leader at the Herald. He won News Journalist of the Year at the 2025 Voyager Media Awards and has twice been named reporter of the year at the NZ Television Awards. He has been a broadcast journalist for 20 years and joined the Herald’s video team in July 2024.