Serial flasher Vaughan Miller sent back to prison for ‘deeply offensive behaviour’ in Nelson region

A man with a habit of exposing himself to middle-aged women wondered why his latest victim was upset when he was “simply a nudist”.

The victim was alone when Vaughan Neil Miller walked into her home, introduced himself and then exposed himself.

He then returned soon after she had told him to leave, and repeated the act.

Police prosecutor Gretchen Keer-Keer told the Nelson District Court this week the woman had been terrified and was left so traumatised she had packed up and moved away.

Judge Noel Sainsbury told the 49-year-old when sentencing him to prison on a charge of performing an indecent act intending to insult and a charge of burglary, that he targeted women of a similar age with his “deeply offensive behaviour”.

On February 22 this year Miller was staying at a rural property in the Nelson region.

A woman in her 50s also lived on the property in a self-contained sleepout, about 150m from where Miller was living in his bus.

The landlord was away at the time, and about 5.30pm, when the victim was in her kitchen, Miller partially entered the small building and introduced himself.

Judge Sainsbury said the woman was not comfortable, then noticed he had moved his shirt to expose his opened shorts and genitalia.

She told him to leave, but about 30 minutes later Miller walked on to the deck area of the sleepout and exposed himself again.

The victim told him to leave and then threatened to call the police if he returned.

Miller apologised, but failed to cover himself up, which caused the woman considerable distress, Judge Sainsbury said.

He said she reported feeling no longer safe.

Judge Sainsbury said it was concerning Miller had “blamed the victim” in that she should not have been upset because he was “simply a nudist”.

“That is nonsense Mr Miller. It is clear there are serious issues at play.”

Judge Sainsbury noted Miller’s troubling list of previous appearances for similar offending in 2010, 2019 and 2021.

In 2022, he was jailed in the Dunedin District Court for two years and two months on four charges of committing an indecent act, two of burglary and two of breaching release conditions.

The charges arose from a six-month spree of indecencies, when Miller terrorised three women in their 60s, beginning in Tauranga in June 2021.

In the shared kitchen of a campsite, Miller began talking to a woman while she was washing dishes.

When she turned around, she saw he had exposed himself.

Later that month, Miller struck again, this time venturing inside the victim’s caravan while she was cooking.

Miller sat with his pants undone “attempting to get a reaction from the victim” but it was only the woman’s dog that seemed interested, the Otago Daily Times reported.

He repeated the performance over the next few weeks, which forced the woman out of her caravan.

Miller left the site after being confronted by the manager following another obscene exposure in front of a staff member.

He was on release conditions at the time following a prison term for similar crimes.

Miller featured in an episode of Police Ten 7 in November 2021, before striking again, this time in Dunedin.

On Christmas Day, 2021, a woman was strolling alone through public gardens when Miller tried to engage the 68-year-old in conversation.

When she became uncomfortable and walked off, he exposed his genitalia.

Miller asked the victim if she wanted to look.

She told him to “put it away”, hurried off and called police.

Judge Sainsbury said in sentencing Miller in Nelson an aggravating feature was that he had “put his foot in the door” of someone’s home and exposed himself.

From an adjusted starting point of 22 months in prison, Miller was awarded a discount for his guilty plea to land at a prison term of 16-and-a-half months.

Judge Sainsbury said even if an address was available for an electronically monitored sentence, prison was the only appropriate outcome.

Miller would be subject to special release conditions.