Although Joe Catholique loves his daughter immensely, he gave up going to police for answers about her disappearance.

He tried to get investigators to continue to search for Charlene Catholique for years, but it was like he was "talking to [a] wall," he said.

"I'm not going to bother them anymore," Catholique said.

The last time he talked to the police about Charlene was around 2008.

Charlene, 15, was from the Lutsel K'e Dene First Nation, a fly-in community on the east arm of Great Slave Lake in the Northwest Territories.

It's been nearly 30 years since she went missing, and little is known about her disappearance.

A former residential school acquaintance of Catholique said they met Charlene before she disappeared near Behchoko, N.W.T., northwest of Yellowknife. The acquaintance saw Charlene looking for a ride, Catholique said.

The acquaintance left for a moment and told Charlene to stay put. When they returned, Charlene was gone.

She was last seen walking along Highway 3 toward Yellowknife.

Catholique said police initially had a suspect in her disappearance, but nothing ever came of it.

On June 9, 2017, the Supreme Court of the Northwest Territories issued an order stating there were reasonable grounds to presume Charlene is dead. She's no longer considered a missing person, but RCMP say her case remains open and active.

Desperate to find his daughter, Catholique travelled to the U.S. and hung posters using his own money.

"I travelled all down into the States, five states," he said.

Catholique said his daughter sometimes said she felt scared but would never explain why.

Charlene, who lost her mom to cancer when she was 12, was raised mostly by her father and grandmother.

"She was quiet [and] friendly. She liked kids," Catholique said.

"She liked to play games with the school kids."

When it comes to Indigenous women and girls who go missing, Catholique feels little is done, and there are often bigger searches for non-Indigenous women and girls.