Police in the Canadian city of Calgary said the bizarre incidents followed weeks of intensifying conflict between neighbours on two floors of an apartment building.

The woman living on the higher floor called the police after returning from a period of absence to find her downstairs neighbour appeared to have tunnelled into her home.

Police subsequently arrested her downstairs neighbour, 46-year-old Ben Edward Maize, who has been charged with offences including breaking and entering with intent to commit criminal harassment.

The case is “a bit of an odd one”, police inspector Keith Hurley told the Calgary Herald.

“We don’t often see something where someone has bored a hole behind someone’s fireplace and been there for an undetermined period of time,” he said.