The brother of murdered Ashburton teenager Kirsty Bentley has given an emotional plea to the New Zealand public in the hope fresh information can be uncovered in the two-decade-long cold case.
Bentley's murder is the country's most famous cold case. She was last seen walking her dog on the afternoon of December 31, 1998.
Her body was found in the Rakaia Gorge more than two weeks later.
Last month, Det Insp Greg Murton said police are now offering a cash reward for information or evidence leading to the identity and conviction of those responsible for her murder.
"Our ultimate goal is to provide answers and a sense of closure for Kirsty's family. That's why today we're offering up to $100,000 for material information or evidence leading to the identity and conviction of the person or people responsible for her death.
"Someone out there knows the truth."
Kirsty's brother John Bentley told Newshub Nation on Saturday it took him a long time to accept his sister wasn't coming home.
"Maybe that was just me being naive and hopeful, but I didn't really appreciate the gravity of it," he told co-host Rebecca Wright.
"I thought she's going to get found and it will be a big deal for a day or two and then move on. There was one day where I just looked at my parents, they were talking to each other, and I could just see it on their faces and I was like, no, they believe she's never coming back."
For a long time, Kirsty's father and brother came under suspicion, devastating both of their lives, but a new investigation has cleared them as suspects.
"It just didn't make sense, you know that you didn't have anything to do with it, but yet they're still pushing and pushing," John Bentley said. "It's worrying and it's frustrating and there's nothing you can do about it. You just have to sit there and take it.
"You're kind of just relying on them, finding evidence to prove who the killer was, to prove your own innocence."
John urges anyone with information about the case to come forward.
"It's really important. The crucial bit of evidence we need, someone might not really be aware of what they've got and if the profile of who the police are looking for has changed, then suddenly things that a person might have dismissed as probably being irrelevant could really be the thing that breaks the case," he said.
John had an appeal to the New Zealand public to help solve this cold case.
"I would ask you to look back around that time and just think about anything that possibly you could tell the police," he told Newshub Nation.
"It could be something really small that might not seem important but could break the case. It's the police's job to determine what's important and what's not and I'd rather that people flood the helpline with everything they know, everything that they've seen, and let the police sort out what's important, and what isn't.
"I have to be Kirsty's advocate, mum has to be. If we don't keep this alive, then people will forget about it and the opportunity to make a change in the case might be lost. We need to remind people that Kirsty existed."
Anyone with information is asked to contact police via 105 and reference Operation Kirsty.
Alternatively, you can call Crime Stoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.
Day of the disappearance (h2)
On the day of her disappearance, Bentley met with a friend at Ashburton library at around 10:30am. The pair then went shopping and had lunch at McDonald's before Bentley was dropped home in the afternoon.
The teen then decided to take the family's black labrador for a walk - this was the last time she was seen alive.
When her mother arrived home that night and she had not returned she searched the route she would normally take twice, before telling Bentley's father who called the police.
Police officers initiated a search but couldn't find Bentley or the family's dog. The next day during another search the dog was found tied to a tree by the Ashburton River along with a pair of underwear and boxer shorts which were later confirmed to be Bentley's.
Searches for the teen continued over the next 16 days until her body was found in the Camp Gully area of Rakaia on January 17.
Watch the full interview with John Bentley above.
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