A TV documentary will next week take a fresh look at the mystery surrounding the disappearance of York chef Claudia Lawrence.

‘Claudia Lawrence: Missing or Murdered?’, which is set to be screened on Channel 5 at 9.15pm next Tuesday, December 3, examines whether the 35-year-old Heworth woman might have been sex trafficked to Amsterdam.

It also reveals that the University of York employee may have spent a night with a mystery man just days before she went missing, and shows her father Peter praying for her with the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, in a moving scene in the chapel at Bishopthorpe Palace.

The broadcast comes nine months after the 10th anniversary of Claudia’s disappearance in March 2009 - a case which the makers say swiftly became one of this century’s most high profile investigations.

A Channel 5 spokeswoman said Claudia’s parents Peter and Joan speak of their 10 years of agony in the programme, while her closest friends describe the young woman they dearly miss.

The documentary also travels to Cyprus, where Claudia dreamed of building a new life. “But when she vanished, police found her passport in her bedroom, so had she been smuggled to the island in a van?” the spokeswoman said. “Claudia’s mum reveals for the first time a new theory about how Claudia might have slipped out of the country.

“How credible was a sighting of Claudia in Amsterdam - could she, as her mum speculates, have been sex trafficked abroad?”

She said Colin Sutton, the detective who brought serial killer Levi Bellfield to justice, also appeared in the documentary, tracking the course of an investigation which still could not supply an answer to the question: is Claudia Lawrence missing, or murdered?

“It’s believed she set off from home to walk to work at 5am,” she said. “Was she abducted en-route? Did she get into the car of someone she knew?

“The inquiry became more complex after the media went into a feeding frenzy over Claudia’s love life. For a time, Claudia was portrayed as a scarlet woman, an image her family and friends say is inaccurate. The tabloid attention made men in the local community reluctant to come forward with information, for fear of being thought to have had an affair with her.

“All the headlines were difficult for Claudia’s family and friends to cope with. The lack of information resulted in the eventual scaling back of one of the biggest inquiries in North Yorkshire Police history – there were arrests, but not enough evidence for anyone to be charged or prosecuted.”

The Press’ Chief Reporter Mike Laycock appears in the documentary, talking about the impact of the tabloid coverage and explaining this newspaper’s role in the reporting of Claudia’s disappearance.