The man long suspected of being behind the 2005 disappearance of Alabama teenager Natalee Holloway is expected to reveal details of her death as part of a plea agreement with prosecutors.
Joran van der Sloot, who was 17 when Holloway went missing on the island nation of Aruba, is expected to plead guilty to attempting to extort money from Holloway’s mother, NBC News reported. Part of that plea agreement requires him to reveal how Holloway died, her family’s attorney, John Q. Kelly, told the outlet.
“It [the plea agreement] was conditioned upon Mr. van der Sloot revealing details of how Natalee died and how her body was disposed of,” Kelly said.
Neither federal prosecutors nor van der Sloot’s attorney have confirmed the plea agreement.
Van der Sloot is accused of extorting money from Holloway’s mother by offering to tell her where her daughter’s body was. The alleged information he provided turned out to be false.
Van der Sloot was extradited to the U.S. earlier this year from Peru, where he was serving 28 years for the 2010 murder of 21-year-old Stephany Flores. An additional 18 years was added to his sentence this January for trafficking cocaine while in prison.
At the end of March 2010, two months before he murdered Flores, van der Sloot allegedly contacted a legal representative of Holloway’s mother, Beth. Van der Sloot said he would tell Beth where her daughter’s body was and what led to her death if she paid him $25,000 upfront and an additional $225,000 later. Kelly, the legal representative, went to Aruba to meet with van der Sloot and gave him $100, after which Kelly reported the encounter to the FBI. A sting operation was set up to catch van der Sloot, who accepted a $15,000 wire transfer to his bank account and a cash payment of $10,000, all of which was recorded by undercover investigators.
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In exchange for the money, van der Sloot told Kelly that his father – a judge – buried Holloway’s body in the foundation of a house. When authorities checked his story, they learned the house hadn’t even been built when Holloway disappeared. Van der Sloot eventually emailed Kelly to admit that he lied.
Instead of arresting van der Sloot then, the FBI allowed him to take the $25,000 and leave for Bogotá, Colombia. He wouldn’t be indicted on the charges for another month, and it wouldn’t be until 2014 that the Peruvian government announced van der Sloot would be extradited to the U.S. to face those charges – in 2023.
Holloway’s body has never been found. Van der Sloot was the last person to see her alive, but neither he nor anyone else has been directly charged for her disappearance.
