3 chilling true crime cases of women who went on vacation and never returned
Natalee Holloway, Brittanee Drexel and Amy Lynn Bradley all vanished on vacation
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Vacations turned into nightmares for these women after they went on a trip they never returned from.
These true crime cases have become the subject of documentaries and podcasts, diving into the details of the disappearances. The families of these individuals spent many years searching for answers. In the case of Amy Lynn Bradley, answers are still being sought, as the case is unsolved to this day.
These are three stories of women who vanished on vacation and where their cases stand now.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Joran van der Sloot murdered Natalee Holloway while she was on vacation in Aruba. (Shelby County Jail, AP)
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1. Natalee Holloway
Natalee Holloway disappeared from her vacation in Aruba in 2005.
She was 18 years old at the time of her disappearance and was traveling to the tropical destination to celebrate high school graduation with her friends.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}On the last night of their trip, the friends went to local bars, where Holloway was last spotted with three men.
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Holloway's disappearance quickly became international news and was investigated up until recently.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}In October 2023, Joran van der Sloot, a primary suspect in the case, confessed to her murder as part of a plea deal on charges of extorting money from her family.
According to the transcript of his confession, van der Sloot gave gruesome details of Holloway's last moments, including that he crushed her head with a cinder block after she refused his sexual advances.
Beth Holloway, mother of Natalee Holloway, spent many years trying to unveil the truth about what happened to her teenage daughter. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
He is also responsible for the death of Stephany Flores, who was killed exactly five years to the day after Holloway's disappearance. He pleaded guilty to her murder in Peruvian court in January 2012.
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Van der Sloot is currently in prison in Peru, where he will serve his 20-year U.S. sentence. He was also ordered to pay $25,100 in restitution to the Holloway family.
"After 18 years, Natalee’s case has been solved," Holloway's mother, Beth Holloway, told reporters following the hearing. "Joran van der Sloot is the killer."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Holloway's story was the topic of a single season documentary called "The Disappearance of: Natalee Holloway," in 2017. There was a documentary released in 2024 about van der Sloot titled "Pathological: The Lies of Joran van der Sloot."
2. Brittanee Drexel
Brittanee Drexel was 17 years old when she took a trip, without her parents' knowledge, to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, for spring break from Rochester, New York. She told her mom that she was spending a couple of days with a friend in Rochester, according to ABC News, but was really headed to Myrtle Beach.
On April 25, 2009, Drexel went missing. She was last seen leaving the hotel lobby. Her boyfriend back home became concerned when she stopped answering his text messages.
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Drexel remained a missing person for many years following her disappearance.
It was not until 13 years after her disappearance that Drexel's remains were found in May 2022. Her remains were discovered 35 miles from where she was last seen.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}In October 2022, Raymond Moody, pleaded guilty to kidnapping, raping and murdering Drexel and was sentenced to life in prison.
Brittanee Drexel was murdered during a spring break trip in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. (Myrtle Beach PD)
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3. Amy Lynn Bradley
Amy Lynn Bradley embarked on a Caribbean cruise with her family in March 1998 when she was 23 years old. The vessel departed for San Juan, Puerto Rico on March 21 and was en route to Aruba, the ship's first port of call, according to FBI.gov.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Following the stop in Aruba, the ship set sail for Curaçao. On March 24, Bradley went missing.
After a night out on the boat with her brother Brad, the siblings went back to their room. The computerized door-lock system on the ship showed Brad arriving back to the room at 3:35 in the morning, according to ABC News, while Amy followed shortly behind.
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{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}When they returned to the room, Brad said they spent time talking before he went to bed for the night, according to the outlet. He last saw her sitting on the chair out on the balcony.
When the family woke the next morning, Amy was nowhere to be found. A search of the boat, land and the ocean were unsuccessful in finding the missing woman.
What happened to Amy still remains a mystery to this day.