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On December 27th 2011, private investigator Julia Robson received an email that would test her commitment, passion and skill over the following seven years.
The email came from Vivian*, a successful and independent woman in her 50’s, who met “Charlie” after replying to his online advertisement on Craigslist.
Claiming to be a millionaire (off the back of his successful career as a property developer) he had landed in Melbourne with the hopes of settling down with a woman.
He shared stories claiming to help those who needed it the most by providing short term loans.
But after a brief but intense relationship, Vivian accepted she had been manipulated out of sex and $70,000 by “Charlie”. She also now had serious concerns about who he really was.
Reaching out to Robson to confirm his identity, Robson’s investigation would see her launch herself into a seven year investigation spanning several continents.
Through the use of surveillance, old school investigation techniques and “a little bit of luck”, Robson confirmed “Charlie” was in fact Paul Bryan Gill – a prolific conman wanted for arrest in New Zealand after escaping the Country in 2009.
Early Days
Born in 1955, Paul Bryan Gill was raised in Huntly, New Zealand where he attended Private boarding school in a neighbouring town. As a young adult he moved to Wellington where he married soon after and eventually relocated to Auckland.
With an interest in engineering, Gill started his own business and things were going well until he stopped paying the bills and debt collectors started knocking on his door.
With a reputation for skipping town in the middle of the night, he would spend the next decade of his life reinventing himself around New Zealand with a multitude of disposable identities.
Despite a brief stint in jail and a few bankruptcies under his belt, by the late 1990’s Gill was also a charming womaniser known to have a few women on the go at any one time.
New Zealand
Several of these women had their lives destroyed by Gill after he manipulated them with false promises, racking up thousands of dollars in debt in their names as well as the names of their loved ones.
One of these women, Tracey, met Gill when she was young, naive and desperate for love. GIll had answered her advert looking for a flatmate, but he very quickly promised her the world and swept her into his world of skipping town, breaking promises of payment and sent her into a downward spiral that would take her years to break free from.
Tracey would eventually expose Gill for leading a double life – living at home with her whilst all along living with another woman and their infant child.
In the early 2000’s, Gill was exposed by local New Zealand media on two occasions, both for taking payments upfront for work never completed. This would see him recognised on television by other victims of his crimes, and ultimately charged with breach of the insolvency act for operating a business whilst bankrupt.
In 2009, Gill adapted his trade and began advertising timber for sale online using the popular site Trademe. Taking payment for thousands of dollars upfront and failing to provide the goods, Gill skipped the country before the Police had a chance to catch up him.
He fled to the French Rivieria where his scams there were later exposed by a local media outlet. During his time in the French Rivieria, whilst allegedly flying to Paris to engage in casual online dating hookups, it was around this time he appears to have started playing around with the alias “Charlie Freeman”.
Once his scams were exposed, he then landed in Australia and began working his way around the Country scamming whoever he came into contact with. He was known to have taken payments upfront for items he never delivered, posed as a successful businessman looking for staff and asked for thousands of dollars from his lovers that he falsely claimed he would invest.
It was during this time in Australia where he met Robson’s client Vivian and other females such as Emma* and Rachel*. All of these women share similar stories of Gill using an alias and promising them the world through false lies and hope.
By 2016, Charlie had remarried an American woman 30 years his junior and had fled to the other side of the world to start a new life with her. His wife Lily* had her own issues, and caught up in the bubble of the fantasy they decided to use other people’s money to fund their nomadic lifestyle travelling throughout Europe.
Arriving back in France, now with a young wife and baby in tow, Gill was using the alias Leon Freeman. Posing as a trustworthy handyman online, the family stayed with elderly couple Hazel* and her husband. Of course, things didn’t go quite to plan and it wasn’t long before Gill packed up his rental car with all his possessions – including tools and other items owned by Hazel – and skipped across the border into Portugal.
Needing a place to stay, the family took shelter in the vacant home belonging to UK resident Yvonne, after promising her they would renovate the place provided she paid thousands of pounds up front to cover all expenses. Barely any work was completed, and it wasn’t long before Yvonne reported the matter both to the Police and the concerned community of expats who shared multiple warnings across local Facebook groups.
By 2018, Gill aka “Charlie” aka “Leon Freeman” encountered an issue. Whilst he had big plans to obtain a sailboat and travel around Asia, the reality was something quite different. His decision to temporarily return to New Zealand would prove to be the end of his international criminal career.
With a Warrant for his Arrest and a tenacious private investigator who had by now been in a cat and mouse chase with him for seven years, Gill’s luck finally ran out in April 2018, when he was arrested with the help of Auckland Police at Westhaven Marina.
Paul Bryan Gill aka “Charlie” was officially charged with 33 counts of Fraud and later sentenced to prison for his crimes.
The full story and original interviews have been shared on the Podcast “Chasing Charlie”.
With the original concept and writing done by Online Investigations Director Julia Robson, the incredible team at Fremantle Media created the final version that went on to become a #1 hit in Australia and New Zealand.
The full story can be heard at https://play.acast.com/s/chasingcharlie
Recognition for “Chasing Charlie” Podcast
Lifehacker.com.au – Top 5 Podcasts to Plug into this June
Daily Telegraph – Your guide to entertaining yourself at home isolation-style
Crimereads.com – 10 true crime podcasts you should be listening to this summer
MarieClaire – 10 Addictive True Crime podcasts to get hooked on in 2020
Womenlovetech – 5 Podcasts to Binge-Listen during lockdown
Urbanlist – Keep Yourself Up at Night with 8 of the Best Chilling True Crime Podcasts
6 Comments
Charlotte Pemberton · October 20, 2020 at 2:06 pm
I remember him well! Unfortunately had 2 children with a old friend of mine who is still recovering from what he did to her. He hurt plenty of people in NZ, stole a Saint Bernard from a friend of mine, left another good friend with debt which she was still repaying until her death a couple of years ago…etc.. the list goes on and on. I hope he stays in jail for a very long time. I’ll be interested to listen to the pod cast!
Annie · December 6, 2021 at 6:59 pm
Good job Julia .. What an ars#$@_
Susan · March 7, 2022 at 5:19 pm
You got some things very wrong.
Online Investigations Team · March 14, 2022 at 6:32 pm
Such as?
Susan Park · May 16, 2023 at 6:14 pm
Tracy has told you some untruths, for a start. I recently found some paperwork that I submitted to the court/ court representative quite a number of years ago. You are welcome to have a copy if you want. I kept in contact with Mr Gill in the hope that I could retrieve at least some of the $44, 000 he has owed me (over 30 years now), but that was never to be. He is a very good con, for sure. You know, he even told me once that he went out with Beaver for a bit. She wised up before many others, it would seem.
Kate · April 13, 2025 at 2:31 am
Confused. What does this mean? Please explain.