KEY POINTS:
Five years ago 30-year-old mother of three Sara Niethe disappeared without a trace.
She drove away from her friend's house on the Hauraki Plains on March 30, 2003, and into the history books as another unsolved missing person case.
It was just days before her daughter's birthday and her disappearance sparked an intensive police inquiry and a search across the plains.
It yielded not the smallest of clues and a few months later police said they were probably looking for a body.
Ms Niethe left her friend Mark Pakenham's house in Kaihere at about midnight for the 10-minute drive to her home in Kerepehi, 18km northwest of Paeroa.
A few weeks later two witnesses said they had seen her blue Honda Civic hatchback car in or near Ngatea, south west of Thames but neither sighting produced any firm leads.
Five years later police are no closer to finding out what happened to her - if she had been murdered, had a fatal accident, or just wanted time out and had gone to ground somewhere.
The time-out option was probably the most unlikely, said police.
"That is not an option. She had too much going for her," said Detective Sergeant Glenn Tinsley from the Waihi police.
Ms Niethe had three children and her daughter Danielle's 11th birthday was a few days after she disappeared. Police believe she would have done anything to be there.
A $50,000 reward, long expired, failed to produce a single lead.
Mr Pakenham, was the last to see her alive when she left his house at Kaihere, 35km northwest of Morrinsville .
He was a "person of interest" but in spite of intense police inquiries, he could produce nothing which even encouraged police to look in a specific spot or come up with a credible suggestion about what had happened to her, said Mr Tinsley.
She had an "involvement" with cannabis but was not a heavyweight drug dealer, "certainly not something you would lose your life for."
He said her file would stay open until her disappearance was resolved.
Police had searched extensively for Ms Niethe, but Mr Tinsley said without any direction, it was virtually impossible to know where to start.
He said she could have had an accident and driven into one of the many irrigation canals around the Hauraki Plans.
She may could also have met with foul play at the hands of another person and Mr Tinsley said as time went on that person might have a change of heart and tell police what had happened.
"The fact that her vehicle hasn't been located does suggest something sinister may have happened to her but there is no clarity as to what," he said.
Nothing could be ruled out and that was the frustrating aspect, he said.
A year after she disappeared her mother Eileen Marbeck placed a memorial plaque in a garden she made for her.
"It's not going to make any difference really. It's just a gesture. I'm never going to believe she is dead until I know for sure that she is."
The plaque read: "Sara, you are always in our thoughts and forever in our hearts."
Police urged anyone with information to call them.
"If this is a result of a sinister act, a criminal act, put yourself in the position of this family," Mr Tinsley said.
- NZPA
