Updated January 14th, 10:00 p.m. I wasn’t aware of it at the time that I put the timeline together, but I had already posted one, albeit incomplete, back in May of 2007.
Scared Monkeys has some recent posts up about Joran and his antics if you want to go check them out. Apparently Joran appeared on the late-night talk show Pauw & Witteman and by the end of the show threw wine in the face of a crime reporter. Good thing he wasn’t alone on the beach with him.
Ever since June of 2005 millions of people around the world and most particularly here in the United States have been wondering just what happened to Natalee Holloway and if she will ever be found.
Although this is titled a “Definitive Natalee Holloway Timeline” this is certainly not meant to be the last source of information and I plan on adding to it as time goes by. I have not added a lot of the stuff that has happened the last couple of months but will when I get the free time. I also need to arrange it in more or a chronological order. I have worked on it off and on when I had free time over the last week or so, it jumps around a bit.
The first I heard of the story was right around the time of this news story at CNN.
Natalee Holloway was on a post-graduation trip to Aruba along with about 100 students from Mountain Brook High School in Alabama in order to celebrate their graduation. Along with the students were seven adult chaperones.
She was last seen in the company of three young men, Joran van der Sloot as well as Deepak and Satish Kalpoe, leaving Carlos & Charlies, a nightclub in Oranjestad. According to initial reports the three men claimed that they took her to Arashi Beach before dropping her off at her hotel about 2 AM. Somewhere between 20 and 40 of her classmates saw her leave the bar with the three young men around 1:30 AM. None of the security cameras at the Holiday Inn where her class was staying show Natalee returning. The class of 124 was scheduled to fly back to the states on that day, May 30th. Her passport, packed luggage, camera and cell phone were all in her hotel room.
This photo was taken with Natalee’s disposable camera on May 29th 2005 with Natalee’s disposable camera just hours before she disappeared.
One interesting thing about the security cameras is that on April 19th, 2006 Beth Twitty stated that the security cameras at the Holiday Inn were not working on the night that Natalee vanished. She has made other statements in public as well as in her book, that the lobby camera was working. This could just be a matter of simple confusion. I would be pretty darned confused if my child had been missing so long. It could also point to the fact that she didn’t know what the hell she was talking about and just had to say something to the media.
This post is extremely long. If you are interested in finishing it, the rest is below the fold.
The initial CNN story that I linked to above was published on June 4th, five days after Natalee’s disappearance. On June 5th Aruban police arrested and charged two security guards at the Hotel Allegro with crimes relating to the disappearance. Neither of the two men were in the group that Natalee left Carlos & Charlies with. A tip had led police to the two men. The two men were Abraham Jones and Mickey John.
This photo shows Police and reporters waiting by the home of one of the suspects arrested in San Nicolas.
June 6th had Aruban government employees join in the search already underway by Aruban police, the FBI and Dutch Marines. At that point some of the searchers were concentrating on the eastern tip of the island, which had already been searched by Dutch marines. The area they were searching is near the oil refining town of San Nicolas, where the two security guards had been arrested the previous day. Aruba’s chief prosecutor at the time, Karen Jansen had also requested that FBI dive teams help to search areas of Aruba’s coast.
On June 9th three more men, the boys who were seen leaving Carlos & Charlies with Natalee, were arrested. At that point there were five people in custody. Under the Dutch judicial system people can be arrested on suspicion of a crime and be formally charged later.
At that point several questions came up based on racial issues. Police had already questioned the three young men but did not formally detain them or seize the car belonging to the Kalpoes. Compared to the two black security guards from the poorer side of the island the three young men were from well to do families. Statements from the government denied it. Karen Jansen said that “The suspicion of a suspect has nothing to do with the color of his skin, but the grounds of suspicion.” According to Prime Minister Nelson Oduber “On this island, nobody stands above the law.”
…
I don’t know a hell of a lot about that but I do know that the media really overdid the story in order to gain ratings. The whole thing and the media circus was a pretty darned good example of missing white woman syndrome. I did a little experiment and posted a very short entry. It included the title, What if Natalee Holloway Was Back and Poor? The post itself was one sentence, although I have updated it and maybe it is one paragraph. Based on the strength of that question and the morbid curiosity of people I got more hits on that entry than most of the others I have written. It also garnered over a hundred comments. While I had never heard of ‘missing white woman syndrome’ or ‘missing pretty girl syndrome’ at that point in time, that was the whole point. The elements of her being pretty, blond, and affluent assed up to positive discrimination in her case. You can deny it all you want but facts is facts.
Anyway, back to what I was doing…
…
2005
Immediately after it was found that Natalee had missed her flight, Natalee Holloway’s step-father George Twitty and her mother Beth flew to Aruba. After questioning the other students they went to the Aruban police with Joran van der Sloot’s name and address and let the police know that he was the last person to see her. Two Aruban policemen and the Twittys went to the Van der Sloot house looking for Natalee. Joran denied knowing who Natalee was but later recanted that statement and said that they took her to the California Lighthouse so that Natalee could see the sharks (at two in the morning). They also made the statement that she had fallen down as she got out of the car and was drunk but refused Joran’s help to get up. They stated that as they drove away she was approached by a black man in a black shirt like the ones that security guards wear.
Her father, Dave Holloway arrived in Aruba two days after her disappearance and went to the police station where he spoke with the case’s lead detective and a police drugs specialist, Dennis Jacobs. According to Dave Holloway the police officer’s first statement to him was “Well, how much money you got?”. Holloway also says that Jacobs told him to go to Carlos ‘n Charlies Bar and that she might turn up there but to watch his drink as “people put stuff in it”.
…
On June 10th, 2005 Natalee Holloway’s family rushed to the lighthouse after a police official told the media that one of the three young men in custody admitted ‘something bad happened’ and was leading police to the scene. Prosecutors refused to confirm or deny the information.
Part of the big problem here is that her parents were TOO involved, almost to the point of obstructing the investigation. Yes, they should have been on top of the case constantly but it’s the job of law enforcement to do the actual investigating. The other big problem though is that the investigation itself always seemed to be running into roadblocks, particularly where the three suspects were concerned.
Through the whole search the Aruban authorities were highly criticized by Natalee Holloway’s family for a perceived lack of progress. Her family even called for a boycott of Aruba which gained the support of Alabama Governor Bob Riley but pretty much ended up fading away.
On June 11th the spokesman for the Aruban Minister of Justice indicated that Natalee Holloway was dead and authorities new the location of her body. He later retracted the statement saying that he was the victim of a misinformation campaign. Later in the evening Police Commissioner Gerald Dompig alleged to the AP that one of the young men admitted ‘something had happened’ to Holloway after the suspects took her to the beach and was leading police to the scene. The next morning Aruban Justice Minister Rudy Croes contradicted the statement saying that the rumor one of the suspects had confessed was untrue.
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that Joran van der Sloot had made statements that Joran had though Deepak Kalpoe had killed the girls. This is a s
can of a document held by DIARIO. Thanks to Scared Monkeys for the document.
Aruban authorities search the home of Joran van der Sloot prior to questioning Paulus van der Sloot.
On June 17th, Steve Gregory Croes was arrested in connection with the case after being questioned. Croes is a party boat disc jockey and apparently knew one of the Kalpoes because they went to the same Internet cafe according to a statement by Croes’ employer Marcus Wiggins.
The next day, June 18th police questioned Paul van der Sloot, the father of Joran. He was questioned for five hours and met with investigators for two more hours the next day. On June 23rd he was arrested.
June 26th – a judge ordered that Paul van der Sloot, a judge in training, and Steven Croes be released from jail but would not explain why they were let go.
June 27th Texas Equusearch volunteers search a rock quarry in Noord, Aruba near the home of one of the suspects in the disappearance.
On June 29th as the three boys sat in the back of a police car this conversation was secretly recorded:
Joran: (with raised voice) You let my father be arrested, friend.
Deepak: (very calm) That’s what I say. How does it feel?
Joran: You know no good that my father has nothing to do [with this}. I have read your statements, friend. You two are lying shit. (then very calmly) You know what happened with that girl. If you don't know it, then nothing happened. (then angrily) So, fuck you. What do you say, that Freddy has to be arrested?
Deepak: That Freddy has to tell the truth.
Joran: You know very well that Freddy has told the truth.
Satish: You will see, you will see.
Deepak: You could have prevented it from the beginning, this, of your father. You know it. That he wasn't arrested.
Joran: How? How? (stretches "how" out) You declare shit against him. My father only wanted to help you, friend. Only to help you was what my father wanted. My father himself arranged your lawyers. And this is how you pay it back. (now with an angry voice) I should hit you both once [een klap moeten geven].
Deepak: Then try it. You can make it better in one time.
Joran: About what? You can also make it better.
Deepak: You just have to tell the truth. Tomorrow, I’ll get my last 8 days and then I’m going home.
Joran: That’s what you think.
Deepak: I’m going home.
Joran: Wait until I’m going to tell stuff about you two. Then we’ll see if you two are going home.
Deepak: I guarantee you.
Joran: Don’t you think that the police is interested in knowing that Satish touched a girl with the car?
[the word 'geraakt' is being used, translated here literally, but you can use the word 'hit' also in the context].
Satish: He heh one [?], you let me laugh boy, just laugh.
Deepak: (to Joran) You know dang well, you always try to put bullshit between us.
Joran: (to Deepak) Then you’re going to tell shit about the ChoHer [choller]? I have helped you with that that shit of the choller friend.
Deepak: And, I also said that.
Joran: That I have not read. I have also read that statement.
Satish: That of the chollers was from me.
Deepak or Satish: I have already told that before. I have also said that in my first statement.
Satish: I said it in my own interest.
Joran: That is what the police tells me now. Police says now to me, like, if you two go against me, I’ll go against you two.
Brothers: (laughing) Hehehehehehehe.
Satish: We don’t put you in trouble. We just tell the truth.
Joran: That you two don’t do. The half of what you two have said isn’t the fucking truth. It will come forward. Just like they check me, they check you two also.
Satish: With us, with us, c
an they get evidence, but with you not. [ a bit unclear: It's: bij ons, bij ons. Kunnen zij bewijzen krijgen, maar bij jou nief] With lies, you don’t get evidence,
Joran: All that shit of “Karen,” all of you two don’t know of no shit. Fuck you two.
Deepak: You think that the girl has nothing on, you will see who fucked who (this sentence was not good to understand) [note of the police officer]
Joran: We will see. Hey, you know when I will laugh, if I’ve given you a slap in the face. I’ll laugh when they find the girl alive, fuck you.
Joran: I know very well that you are afraid. That is if you two have done something bad with that girl. En if they find the girl, then we shall see
Satish: I’m not afraid. Why must I be afraid?
Deepak: I want them to find the girl. You are going to tell shit about me that I have buried the girl at fishermans hut
Joran: Who has said about burying? I didn’t say anything about burying.
Deepak: That’s what you have stated. Stop with that bullshit.
Joran: I have said nothing about burying. The only thing what I can think of, is that you know people that it is the people of automotive enterprises.
Satish: Yeah, yeah,yeah, yeah,yeah,yeah, then I had a flat tire, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,yeah… I picked you up, right. And then I went back to the beach for her.
Joran: Who has said that?
Satish: You said that.
Joran: I have never said that friend. I have never said that you went back, friend.
Joran: That’s your problem. If they find that girl, then they will see that shit.
Deepak: Eight more days and then I’m going home, I guarantee you that for a 1000 per cent.
Joran: We will see.
Deepak: (to Joran) You don’t give a shit about your, the members of your own family.
Joran: The only thing that I can think of is my family. I do what my family tells me to do. Right, retard.
Deepak: Your own father, unbelievable.
Joran: What my father, it is your fault that he is arrested. I didn’t declare anything against my father, you two declared against my father
Satish: We didn’t declare anything.
Joran: Or course, you did.
Satish: What did I tell against your father?
Joran: You are telling that he declared, that if there is no body [lijk = dead body], there is no case or I don’t what. All shit. That is totally not true, the only thing is that he said is, if there is no body [lichaam = body], then there isn’t a case.
Deepak: Yes, that’s true.
Joran: That’s not true.
Deepak: I also said in my statement, that it wasn’t meant like that.
Joran: Didn’t read it in your statement. They use that now against my father.
Deepak: We suffered a lot because of you.
Joran: That’s the price that you let my father pay. That you let him suffer like that. Fuck you. If you let me suffer, I say ok. It doesn’t matter to me. I can just sit here for 160 days. It doesn’t make a fucking difference to me. I’m sitting good here.
Brothers: Me too. Me too.
Joran: And you Satish, they’re telling me that you asshole, see ghosts in the [jail]cell. They told me that you saw the girl in your cell and that you were very scared.
Satish: Me seeing ghosts? Two other boys were seeing ghosts. You also believe the people who are here in jail. That has nothing to do with ghosts and that is just garbage shit what you say.
Joran: They talk good about me, but not good about you. And also the two security guards, they have guaranteed me that they will kill you two, if you go out of jail.
Deepak: Oh, yes.
Joran: Who has declared about the security guards, you no tme. Why? because I don’t want to put anyone in trouble who has nothing to do with the case.
Deepak or Satish:(screaming) That lie was for you.
Joran: You admitted that.
Deepak or Satish:(screaming) That lie was for you.
Joran: You two paid him off, right.
Brothers: ha ha ha ha ha ha
Joran: You said then via the telephone like, that I have the jackpot. You said now [?] through the phone , I have the fucking jackpot. You forget that the phone is tapped, right?
Satish or Deepak: Shut your trap [hou je bek]
Joran: You forget that, right retard? Then you arrive home and you say how you arranged everything. You say “I have fixed it”. Good for you [meaning your own fault]. because of you he is also in jail.
Deepak: Yeaaaaaaaaahhh! Yeahhhhhhhhh!
Joran: (to brothers)Man, what can you go do? [illegible, what is typed is: jucfc juflfe]
Deepak: (to Joran) Wh
at can you go do?
Joran: Make me, shut my mouth no.
Brothers: Fuck you, we don’t talk anymore with you.
Deepak: (to Joran) You talk until you get tired.
Satish: (to Deepak) Do you have clothes?
Deepak: What am I going to do with those? I’m leaving anyway in [illegible] days.
Joran: That’s what you think.
Deepak: Shut your trap. Shut your trap, you bitch. Fuck your father.
Joran: If my father doesn’t leave tomorrow, then you’ll see. Boy, shut your mouth before I hit it shut.
Deepak: Do it then, you’re already in jail.
Joran: Doesn’t matter to me. They can even put me in the fucking solitary [cashot]. It doesn’t matter to me.
Deepak: They’re going to give you fifteen years if they find the girl.
Joran: For what? for what?
Deepak: That scholarship of yours. Byeeeeeeee. You can forget it.
Joran: Yeah, by who? By you, retard. You know well that you did bad, otherwise you wouldn’t lie.
Brothers: aaiaaieaaieeaiee!
Joran: I should have killed you, retard. Shut your trap.
Deepak: Won’t be fun, if you are standing in front of the judge of instructions tomorrow. Why not? Too much evidence?
Joran: Then they are also allowed to hit me. Do you think that it makes a difference to me. One slap will be enough.
Satish: You think, you think.
Joran: What do you think, that you are going home to get your gun?
Satish: That I have a gun.
Joran: Satish, you, get gun at home, me shoot you two dead.
Satish: Look, the police already went to my house and already investigated [searched] the house. Did they find a gun? What will she get? ["Wat zal zij krijgen." The word 'zij' is for the word 'she' or for 'they', but they use the singular verb for 'will', therefore'she']
Deepak: (to Joran) Sometimes, you talk bullshit, right?
Joran: (to Deepak) Why is that shit not true? Witnesses saw you.
Satish: In the end we will see, who gets out and who stays. You tell the truth, we shall see.
Joran: I know that I’m getting out.
Brothers: We shall see. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
On July 4th a judge ordered the Kalpoes immediate release from jail but ruled that there was enough evidence to hold Joran van der Sloot for another 60 days while prosecutors built their case.
Paul van der Sloot
July 25th, 2005. Natalee Holloway’s family increased the reward for information leading to her safe return to $1 million. There is also a $100,000 reward for any information that helps authorities solve her disappearance.
On July 27th a large pond was drained across from the Marriott Hotel after a tip from a witness claimed to have seen Joran van der Sloot driving with Deepak and Satish riding with him. Once on the stand the witness was declared to be not credible when lawyers destroyed his stories.
On August 26th, 2005 Satish and Deepak Kalpoe were arrested for the second time. Aruban officials detained them on suspicion of involvement in premeditated murder and rape.
On September 1st 2005 A judge ordered Joran van der Sloot’s release from jail and the Kalpoes were ordered to be released on the 3rd. On the 6th of September van der Sloot left Aruba to go to college in Holland.
During the interrogation Joran van der Sloot stated to police that he left Holloway at the Marriott Hotel beach near the fishermen’s huts and phoned Deepak Kalpoe for a ride home and that Satish drove him home. The Kalpoes agree that van der Sloot and Holloway were dropped off there but denied that they returned to pick him up. At one point van der Sloot told a third story that he was dropped off at home and Holloway was driven off by the Kalpoe brothers. Gerald Dompig discounted the story saying that “this latest story came when he saw the other guys, the Kalpoes, were kind of finger-pointing in his direction, and he wanted to screw them also, by saying he was dropped off. But that story doesn’t check out at all. He just wanted to screw Deepak. They had great arguments about this in front of the judge. Because their stories didn’t match. This girls, she was from Alabama, she’s not going to stay in the car with two black kids. We believe their second story, that they were dropped off by the Marriott”.
On September 15th Dr Phil aired portions of an interview between a private investigator, Jamie Skeeters and Deepak Kalpoe. It has since been proven that the Dr Phil show actually edited the tape to show something completely different. Here is a portion of the interview.
The entire transcript is pretty long so I am going to just point a link to it over at scrux.com
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At the end of October 2005 Dave Holloway and Texas EquuSearch finally leave Aruba. The photo to the left shows Tim Wiggins, the founder and director of Texas EquuSearch checking a night vision camera. Texas EquuSearch has a 70% success rate in finding it’s targets in over 450 missing persons searches as of 2005. EquuSearch sent trained divers, sonar search equipment and other volunteers to help with the search for Natalee.
On November 10th in a fairly quiet legal move, Joran’s father Paul van der Sloot won an unjust detention action against the Aruban government and with that court victory is no longer legally a suspect in the case.
2006
In January of 2006 Vanity Fair published an article entitled “Missing White Female“. In the article some of the behavior of the seniors during their trip was discussed. Apparently due to the behavior of the previous group the 2006 seniors were not welcomed at the Holiday Inn. Natalee’s behavior in particular was discussed. According to some of the reports at one point Holloway lay down on the bar and let van der Sloot lick a body shot off her stomach. One of her roommates told the FBI that she and Holloway had been doing Jello Shots before van der Sloot’s arrival. Her friends claim that she had been drinking all day and Gerald Dompig indicated that the police have evidence to corroborate that. He also indicates that their was evidence that points to possession of drugs by Holloway.
Flash forward forward five months to the end of March 2006. The lead investigator in the Natalee Holloway case receives a tip and they are hopeful that police might be able to find her. On April 15th while we were all fretting about the IRS, Aruban authorities reveal that they have made a new arrest in her disappearance. 19-year-old Geoffrey Van Cromvoirt, known at the time by the initials ‘G.V.C’ is detained. He was also being held on suspicion of drug offenses and they suspected him in Natalee’s disappearance. Police release Cromvoirt on April 24th. The prosecutor’s office maintained that he was still a suspect. They also release the fact that they had arrested a 20-year-old man on April 22nd and interrogated him for six hours and then released him.
In mid-May 2006 Dutch police detain a man in the town of Utrecht on suspicion of participating in the kidnapping and killing of Natalee Holloway. According to the man’s attorney, Gerard Sponge (apt name for an attorney), his client was suspected of assisting in the murder of the Alabama high school senior. He was released a week later due to the fact that there was not enough evidence to hold him. Guido Wever is the son of a former Aruban politician. Aruban authorities requested his transfer to the island but he was released instead.
2007
On April 16th 2007 a combined Aruban-Dutch team began pursuing the investigation in Aruba again after a book was released by Joran van der Sloot and reporter Zvezdana Vukojevic entitled “De Zaak Natalee Holloway” (“The Case of Natalee Holloway”).
Several months passed and the three boys, Joran van der Sloot, Satish and Deepak Kalpoe are all rearrested on November 21st 2007. Aruban authorities had them arrested on suspicion of involvement in manslaughter and causing seriously bodily harm that caused the death of Natalee Holloway.
After the release of Joran van der Sloot and the Kalpoes van der Sloot told a Dutch newspaper that he regretted that he was not formally prosecuted for any crime. Aruban authorities closed the investigation on December 18th saying that they believed Holloway is dead but that they did not have enough evidence to prosecute van der Sloot or the other two former suspects. According to the newspaper DAG van der Sloot said “I would have liked to have seen a trial so that everything could be out in the open” in his first public remarks since he was released on December 7th. The interview was conducted via email with van der Sloot in Aruba where he is currently staying with his family. Van der Sloot denies that their was any new evidence as prosecutors had asserted. He believes that his latest arrest was intended to please the American media. “I’ve been declared guilty without any factual evidence and I’m left to prove my innocence” he told the paper.
Links
Holloway Case Suspect Regrets No Trial
Natalee Holloway Wikipedia Entry.
scrux.com – a wealth of media and information in the Natalee Holloway investigation.
Scared Monkeys – Since early on the guys over at Scared Monkeys have been posting information on the disappearance.
This is my Happy New Year! open trackback article for January 1st 2008. May everyone have a wonderful new year and gain all of the happiness that they deserve. If you have something interesting to post or just want to show off your work, feel free to ping this article and your link will show up here.
