Suspect in Natalee Holloway case to be extradited to US
Fox Nation host Nancy Grace joined 'America's Newsroom' to discuss the latest on the case and why Joran van der Sloot is now facing extradition from Peru.
Joran van der Sloot, the prime suspect in the disappearance of Natalee Holloway, cannot be accused of murdering her because her body has never been found, his lawyer says.
Van der Sloot is the prime suspect in the Alabama student's May 2005 disappearance during her Mountain Brook High School of Alabama. senior class trip to Aruba.
The Dutch national is facing charges of extortion and wire fraud in the United States after he allegedly tried to sell Beth Holloway, Natalee's mother, information regarding the location of her daughter's body. The Peruvian government ruled earlier in May that he would be temporarily transferred to the United States to face those charges, then returned to the United States when he's sentenced.
Federal prosecutors say van der Sloot asked for $250,000 — $25,000 up front for the information and the rest being paid out when the body of Natalee Holloway was positively identified.
Joran Van der Sloot of the Netherlands (C) is transferred by the police from the police headquarters to the prosecutor's office in Lima June 10, 2010. An official at the Peruvian national police's criminal investigations unit told Reuters on Tuesday that Van der Sloot admitted he killed 21-year-old Stephany Flores, whose body was found in a Lima hotel room last week. (Reuters/Stringer )
His Peruvian lawyer, Maximo Altez, told Fox News Digital that van der Sloot cannot be accused of killing Natalee Holloway because her body has never been found.
"Mrs. Holloway is sure that he killed her daughter. I have never said that [van der Sloot] had nothing to do with the homicide, what I have said is that they are taking Joran for extorsion and bank fraud. They can't accuse him of the girl's murder because the body has never been found," Altez said. "[van der Sloot] believes that he will win in the United States, the evidence shows that they were the ones who contacted him, not the other way around. Joran took the $25,000 USD and disappeared; the FBI lost track of him. The FBI itself did not know where he was. And he appeared in Peru."
A body isn't necessarily needed to convict an individual of murder, and there have been many convictions in the United States in which the deceased individual was never found.
Paul Flores was convicted in 2022 of killing California college student Kristin Smart after she went missing in 1996.
Smart was a student at Cal Poly’s San Luis Obispo campus when she left an off-campus party with a man, woman, and Flores. But others in the group left after Flores allegedly said multiple times that he could get Smart home safely. She wasn't seen again.
Flores was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.
Joran Van der Sloot (L) is escorted by police officers to the airport in Santiago June 4, 2010. Van der Sloot of the Netherlands, who was arrested twice over the disappearance of a U.S. student in Aruba in 2005, has been expelled from Chile and will be handed out to Peruvian authorities where he is a prime suspect in a new murder probe, according to local media reports. (Reuters/Victor Ruiz Caballero)
Altez previously told Fox News Digital that van der Sloot has fans from "all over the world" who send him hundreds of dollars per month.
"All his fans from all over the world sent letters to Joran. I rented him a P.O. Box to receive them. Some letters brought 10 euros, 20 euros, 5 dollars. They were girls who wrote and sent him letters with money, and he answered them all," Altez said.
Natalee Holloway was last seen alive in Aruba while on a Mountain Brook high school senior trip. (Federal Bureau of Investigation)
Van der Sloot is in a Peruvian prison for the murder of 21-year-old Stephany Flores in 2010. His original sentence was 28 years, but he got more time because of a drug smuggling scandal in prison.
He will be transferred from Challapalca Maximum Security Prison to a different prison in Lima, Peru before he's transferred from Peru to the United States in early June.
Natalee Holloway's mother, Beth, said in an earlier statement shared with Fox News Digital that the transfer gives a chance for justice to finally be served.
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Beth Holloway, mother of Natalee Holloway, speaks during the opening of the Natalee Holloway Resource Center (NHRC) at the National Museum of Crime & Punishment in Washington, June 8, 2010. Natalee, 18, of Mountain Brook, Alabama, vanished while on a high school graduation trip to Dutch-owned Aruba, an island in the Caribbean in 2005. She never showed up for a flight home and her disappearance made international headlines. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
"I was blessed to have had Natalee in my life for 18 years, and as of this month, I have been without her for exactly 18 years. She would be 36 years old now," Beth Holloway said. "It has been a very long and painful journey, but the persistence of many is going to pay off. Together, we are finally getting justice for Natalee."
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