When her beloved 12-year-old daughter went missing in 1980, the shock and trauma was almost too much for Marion Mott. Lisa Mott had been out playing basketball on a Thursday night in the small town of Collie, about 200 kilometres south of Perth, and was heading home on foot when she parted ways with her friend. She hasn't been seen since.
In a video interview with WA Police in 2023 recorded for their Cold Case podcast, Lisa's mother, now called Marion Flower, spoke of the devastating aftermath. "I went into shock and I ended up in the Collie Hospital in the middle of the night," a frail looking Mrs Flower said. "I was screaming and I could not stop myself.
The night sister put me under a shower and left me there until I calmed down." Lisa's mother described her daughter as a thoughtful child with a "lovely nature". The shock that she experienced reverberated well beyond the walls of the small country hospital that night, and beyond the streets of the tightly knit coal mining community.
The disappearance of the Year Seven primary schooler made national news and would feature regularly in the Perth media in the ensuing months and years as police made increasingly desperate pleas for information. And 44 years later, they're still appealing. This time, however, they say there has been a significant breakthrough.
'A lovely kid' Lisa had left home on the evening of October 30, 1980 at about 6:45pm to go with a friend to play basketball on the local courts in nearby Throssell Street.
