Forty years ago today, on 28 July 1986, 25-year-old estate agent Suzy Lamplugh disappeared from Fulham, west London, after leaving her office to show a property to a client known only as "Mr Kipper". Her white Ford Fiesta was later found abandoned nearby with her purse still inside, but she was never seen again, and today police are set to formally close the file on what became Britain's biggest ever missing-person investigation. The case, which drew huge public interest and extensive media coverage at the time, resonated widely because of fears it could happen to any young woman working in a similar role.

Lamplugh, who grew up in Cheltenham and London as the daughter of a solicitor, had been hired on the spot as an estate agent after working as a beautician on the QE2, with her employer placing her in the office's window seat because she was considered attractive. A force of 40 officers investigated her disappearance, and her mother Diana became a tireless campaigner for answers, later receiving an OBE in 1992, before her death. Despite dozens of witness interviews, the investigation never resulted in a conviction, and her sisters, Lizzie Bingham and Tamsin Tomlin, continue to keep her memory alive within the family four decades on.