Haunting email Joran van der Sloot sent claiming Natalee Holloway was ‘still there’ before confessing to killing
Joran van der Sloot, who confessed to killing Natalee Holloway, sent a series of twisted emails to her mother's attorney about the location of her body, as shown in the new Netflix three-part documentary Taken: Natalee Holloway.
Holloway vanished on May 30, 2005, while on a trip to Aruba. She had graduated from Mountain Brook High School days before the trip, and traveled with other graduates to celebrate.
On the final night of the trip, Holloway left the club with Joran van der Sloot, and never returned. As the last person who saw her, the Dutch native, who was 17 at the time, remained a key suspect, but was never charged.
However, on October 18, 2023, almost two decades after her disappearance, he confessed to killing her during a federal court hearing in Alabama as part of a plea agreement.
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He pleaded guilty to federal extortion and wire fraud charges for attempting to scam Holloway's mother, Beth Holloway, asking for money in exchange for information on Natalee's whereabouts. He had falsely claimed he could reveal the location of Natalee's remains.
Joran van der Sloot's haunting emails five years after Holloway's disappearance
It all began in March 2010 when Joran van der Sloot contacted Beth Holloway's attorney John Q. Kelly.
As per the Netflix documentary, an email to Kelly from van der Sloot read: "Hi John, I will take you to Natalee. In return I want to receive $250,000."
A follow-up read: "John, I went by the location myself last week to pay respects and from what I felt and how the place looked she is still there."
A third stated: "I will take you to the place where Natalee is and once you see it you will understand a lot more."
In the doc, Kelly responded: "I thought it was complete [expletive]. I knew he had no intention of giving any truthful information whatsoever.
"But I told Beth that there might be play there to get him trapped on an extortion wire fraud charge."
Kelly traveled to Aruba as part of an 'undercover investigation'
Following the emails, Beth and Kelly worked with the FBI to set up an undercover operation aimed at gathering evidence against van der Sloot, in which Kelly traveled to Aruba.
Two FBI agents monitored proceedings from a hotel room, while Beth remained in the United States, ready to transfer the money.
On 10 May 2010, Beth wired $15,000, while Kelly handed van der Sloot a further $10,000 in cash at the hotel. In never-before-seen FBI footage featured in the doc, van der Sloot was seen signing an agreement promising to provide information about Natalee's whereabouts.
"I had to pretend like I thought this was a binding agreement," Kelly said. "I knew [Beth] wasn't going to pay him the other $225,000. Because if he disclosed Natalee's whereabouts he was going to be arrested for it, and if he didn't disclose what happened, he was going to be arrested anyway for extortion and wire fraud."
Van der Sloot claimed Natalee's body was in the concealed in the foundation of a house, which was proven a lie by the FBI. He later acknowledged the information he supplied was worthless.
Less than a month later, on June 3, 2010, van der Sloot was arrested in Chile for the murder of Stephany Flores Ramírez. He was subsequently transferred to Peru, and pleaded guilty in January 2012, where he was sentenced to 28 years in prison.
Van der Sloot confessed to killing Holloway 18 years after her disappearance
In October 2023, the 39-year-old pleaded guilty in a US federal court to one count of extortion and one count of wire fraud relating to his attempts to obtain money from Beth Holloway.
He was sentenced to 20 years in prison. As part of his plea agreement, he was required to provide a truthful account of what happened to Natalee almost two decades on from her disappearance.
During his confession, he admitted to killing the 18-year-old after she rejected his sexual advances. He claimed that following an altercation, he kicked Natalee in the face before striking her head with a cinder block. He then said he dragged her body into the sea and pushed it out into deeper water. Her remains have never been uncovered, and van der Sloot has not been charged with her murder.
His US conviction related solely to the extortion and wire fraud offences.
Joran van der Sloot is currently incarcerated at the maximum-security Challapalca Prison in Peru where he is serving a 28-year prison sentence for Flores's murder. An additional 18 years were added for trafficking drugs while in prison.
Topics: True crime, Netflix, Crime
Kiesha Dosanjh
