Description: in 2003 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.

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.

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.

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.

She had an "involvement" with cannabis but was not a heavyweight drug dealer

Her file will stay open until her disappearance was resolved.

A year after she disappeared her mother Eileen Marbeck placed a memorial plaque in a garden she made for her.

The plaque read: "Sara, you are always in our thoughts and forever in our hearts."

A $50,000 reward was initially offered but has long expired. Negotiations will take place to re instate this reward if information resulting in the recovery of Sarahs body or the conviction of her killer / killers is received.

Contact "Spillane" via this site for additional information.