‘My daughter vanished in 1981 and I will never stop searching for her’

It’s every parent’s worst nightmare, turning your back for a second and losing a child in that instant.

For most, it’s a heart-dropping moment soon replaced by a wave of relief minutes later. However, for the Lee family, the anxiety has never ended after their toddler daughter Katrice vanished from a shopping centre in 1981.

‘She was two-years-old when she went missing,’ Richard, Katrice’s father, tells Metro. ‘What kind of child was she? She was very mischievous, she could be cantankerous. There was a five-year age gap between Katrice and her older sister Natasha, but they absolutely adored each other. 

‘I remember the pair of them playing hide and seek one day. Katrice had hidden behind some big, long curtains but her little feet were poking out. We could clearly see her, but she thought she was invisible. Natasha came in and joked “Oh, I can’t see Katrice, I’ll go look somewhere else”. She was very protective of her younger sister.’

Katrice and Natasha lived with parents Richard, from Hartlepool, and Sharon, from Portsmouth, at a British Army base in Paderborn, Germany, where their father served as a sergeant in the 15th/19th King’s Royal Hussars. As a forces family surrounded by other Brits, there was a strong sense of community in the apartment block where they lived.

When Katrice turned two on November 28, 1981, her family gathered in Paderborn to mark the occasion and planned a tea party later that day. They sang Happy Birthday at breakfast, then Richard drove Sharon, her sister Wendy and Katrice to the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes (NAAFI) shopping complex in nearby Schloß Neuhaus.  It was the final payday before Christmas and the shopping complex was full of people. Richard waited in the car as the others headed in.

At the check-out, Sharon remembered she had forgotten to grab crisps and forged a path back through the throng of shoppers. Wendy saw Katrice, dressed in a blue duffle coat worn over a pinafore dress and red wellies, toddle along after her mother. But when Sharon came back, Katrice was not with her. Joined by other shoppers, Sharon and Wendy shouted out the youngster’s name and checked every aisle. 

Initially, it was unclear whether the Royal Military Police (RMP) or the German Bundespolizei should lead the investigation, which meant vital time was lost. Witnesses left the supermarket and employees finished shift before interviews began and border staff were not informed of the incident straight away, despite the fact Paderborn is just two hours away from the Netherlands and Belgium.

The RMP, who did eventually take control of the investigation, seemed convinced Katrice, who did not speak any German, had wandered off towards the River Lippe which stretched past the NAAFI shopping complex, possibly to see some ducks there. The Lee family disagreed. Katrice didn’t like water – she didn’t enjoy baths, for example – so it would not make sense for her to approach a loud and fast-flowing river.

‘We were accused of clutching at straws,’ sighs Richard. ‘I don’t think every avenue was explored or that the family’s wishes were respected. The RMP closed ranks and we’ve got nowhere.’

Richard served in the British Army for 34 years and gained medals for his efforts. In interviews after Katrice vanished, his voice never faltered and he stood steadfast in front of cameras. But behind closed doors, it was a different story.

He explains: ‘When Katrice went missing we had two bathrooms. I would go into the smaller one and cry my eyes out. Then I’d wash my face and come back out as a “brave soldier” in the eyes of anyone else. I’d been brought up where a man couldn’t be seen to show his emotions. If I did get upset, my dad would say “I’ll give you something to cry about” then put a hand over my head.

‘That stayed with me. From the outside, I was in control. I would nod, smile and cover my feelings. But I was hurting badly on the inside, my mind was not my own. 

‘I also turned to the drink. I would go to work drunk, my mind wasn’t my own. At one point I made plans to end my own life and decided where I would do it, the underground car park in the block of flats where we lived. But I managed to climb out of that pit. I realised I had a job to do. I needed to find out what had happened to Katrice, I couldn’t let her down.’

One theory which keeps Richard up at night is that his daughter could have been taken and raised by a different family elsewhere in Europe. This is bolstered by the fact that, in 2017, it was revealed a man with a green saloon car had been seen with a girl who matched Katrice’s description in the carpark of the NAAFI shopping complex the day she vanished. 

Richard, 75, explains: ‘We later found out there was a lucrative trade going on with people selling children to the east. I also heard about nuns in Italy who were selling children in the 1980s.

‘All of this came to light years later but these avenues weren’t explored by the police. Ultimately what we’ve had since day one is a lack of honesty and clarity. I still want to know who, in 1981, had decided Katrice had gone into the river. Was there any proof?

‘I just wish the police had tried to join the dots from day one, not from 36 years later.’

In 2000, Katrice’s case was reopened under the name ‘Operation Bute.’ The same year, Crimewatch aired a reconstruction of the disappearance on what would have been her 21st birthday in November. A suspect was arrested, but later released without charge.

An anonymous woman left a curious message with Richard and said ‘look for your daughter in France’, but nothing came of this.

In 2012, the Royal Military Police admitted mistakes were made during the first investigation and, for the second time, the case was reopened. The River Alme was pinpointed as an area of interest, due to information that revealed a green saloon car – like the one seen at the NAAFI shopping centre on the day Katrice vanished – had been seen in the area.

Five years later, in 2017, an e-fit of a man police wanted to speak to was released. The following year a team of military personnel and civilian forensic experts announced they planned to excavate a stretch of the riverbank along the River Alme. There was hope in 2019, when a person in Swindon was arrested ‘in connection with the disappearance of Katrice Lee.’ But the man, a former serviceman, was released without charge two days later.

‘The family was never given enough updates,’ Richard says. He divorced from Sharon in 1989 but they remain united in their search for Katrice. He adds. ‘During the River Alme search in 2018, police found bone fragments which went away for analysis. Sharon and Natasha were walking on eggshells for about six weeks, but I was convinced it wasn’t Katrice.

‘DNA revealed that they actually belonged to a horse. But we didn’t find that out from the police, they posted the information on Twitter before they told us. We got phone calls from friends which let us know the bones weren’t Katrice’s. It was two hours later that a police liaison officer called to inform of us the news and apologise for yet another c***-up.’

In 2020 the RMP made the decision to cease active investigations into Katrice’s disappearance.

Through decades of frustration, the Lee family have received support from charity Missing People. Natasha, who sewed a button from one of Katrice’s cardigans into her wedding dress when she got married, has worked closely with the charity to keep her sister’s name in the spotlight.

‘Before, there had been nobody we could talk to about what we were going through,’ Richard, who was discharged from the Army in 1999, adds.

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‘The charity has been a huge support, we bow to their expertise. Natasha brought Katrice’s case to Missing People and they helped get coverage on Channel 5. We both fundraise for them, I sell car stickers and t-shirts.’

Richard hopes to meet Sir Keir Starmer one day to discuss his daughter’s case.  In May 2024, he travelled to Downing Street in an attempt to hand his service medals back to the British Army in protest over the handling of his daughter’s case. Outside Number 10, he posed in a black t-shirt with Katrice’s face on it with the words ‘STILL MISSING’ above the photo. Richard was told he could not hand back his medals as they were classed as personal belongings.

Later that year, he and Natsaha travelled to Germany and the exact spot where the little girl vanished from. There, a photograph exhibition called ‘Missing Katrice’ took place, as the NAAFI supermarket is now an art gallery.  He hopes to one day find answers as to what happened to his daughter.

‘My aim is to get answers. It’s as simple as that,’ says Richard, who lives alone. ‘I’ve never lost hope, hope is eternal. It’s the last thing any family with a missing child has. Hope never dies.’

An MOD Spokesperson said: ‘Our thoughts and sympathies remain with Katrice Lee’s family. If anyone has any new information relating to the disappearance of Katrice, please contact us on 0800 616 888.

‘The Defence Serious Crime Unit assumed primacy of the investigation in 2022 into the disappearance of Katrice Lee and we continue to appeal for new evidence.‘

Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing Kirsten.Robertson@metro.co.uk 

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