Suzy Lamplugh case: police vow to find missing estate agent 40 years on

Forty years ago this week, a young estate agent left her office in Fulham to show a property to a client who called himself “Mr Kipper” — and was never seen again. Suzy Lamplugh was 25 years old. She was declared dead, presumed murdered, in 1994. No body has ever been found.

And yet detectives working the case say they haven’t given up. Not by a long shot.

A case that refuses to go cold

Lamplugh vanished on 28 July 1986 after leaving her office at Sturgis Estate Agents on Fulham Road. She was due to meet a client at a house in nearby Shorrolds Road at around 12.45pm. She never returned. Her car, a white Ford Fiesta, was later found unlocked about a mile away, her purse still inside.

Police have long suspected convicted murderer John Cannan, who was in the area at the time and was known to use the nickname “Kipper.” Cannan, now 71 and serving a life sentence for the 1987 murder of Shirley Banks, has always denied any involvement in Lamplugh’s disappearance.

“We’re not going to give up,” a Metropolitan Police spokesperson said this week. “We continue to review the case and we’d urge anyone with information, however small it might seem, to come forward.”

Decades of searching

Officers have conducted multiple searches over the years. In 2002, they dug up the garden of a property in Sutton, Surrey — a house that Cannan had access to. Nothing was found. A further search near Drakes Broughton in Worcestershire was carried out in 2018 following a tip-off. Again, nothing. Still, police insist the searches will continue if credible new information emerges.

The case fundamentally changed how Britain thought about personal safety. Suzy’s mother, Diana Lamplugh, founded the Suzy Lamplugh Trust in 1986, which became one of the UK’s leading personal safety charities. Diana died in 2011, never knowing what happened to her daughter.

A family still waiting

Suzy’s brother Richard has spoken publicly in recent days about the toll four decades of uncertainty takes on a family. It’s a grief with no endpoint — no grave to visit, no definitive answer, no closure. He has urged anyone who knows anything to finally speak out.

That plea matters more than it might seem. Cold cases are solved every year as forensic technology improves and as people who once stayed silent change their minds.

What happens next

The Metropolitan Police say advances in DNA analysis and digital forensics mean evidence gathered in 1986 can now be examined in ways that simply weren’t possible at the time. Detectives are actively reviewing that original material.

Forty years is a long time. But it isn’t forever. And for the people who loved Suzy Lamplugh, finding out what happened to her is still everything.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the Metropolitan Police via 101 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.