Nine of the biggest revelations from Netflix's documentary about Natalee Holloway's disappearance
As a new Netflix documentary sheds fresh light on the disappearance of 18-year-old Natalee Holloway, the question of exactly what happened to her remains unanswered.
Her body has never been found, and the case continues to raise disturbing questions about the events surrounding her final night.
Netflix's Taken: Natalee Holloway revisits the case through comprehensive interviews with her mother, Beth, her friends, FBI agents, and the Aruban police chief at the time
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The Alabama teenager was last seen alive in the early hours of May 30, 2005 during a graduation trip to Aruba, leaving a bar with Joran van der Sloot and brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe.
What followed was an international investigation, a media frenzy and strained relations between the United States and the Dutch Caribbean island.
In 2023, van der Sloot confessed to killing Holloway, but has never been formally charged with her murder.
Below are the nine standout revelations about the case from the documentary.
Natalee's friends were not initially concerned about her disappearance
Natalee's friends were not alarmed when they watched her leave, according to her friend Madison Greer, because taxis on the island were unmarked ordinary cars.
Van der Sloot, then a 17-year-old local, had told them he was a college student from Holland.
Natalee’s mum’s gut feeling
Beth rushed to Aruba and confronted van der Sloot at his home with his father present.
He allegedly claimed he kissed Natalee on a beach and dropped her at her hotel, but she knew in her ‘gut’ he was lying.
From that day on, she suspected he had something to do with Natalee's disappearance.
Why Van der Sloot was not arrested until ten days later
Van der Sloot was the primary suspect, yet he was not arrested until 10 days after Natalee vanished.
Police first detained two hotel security guards because he had initially said guards helped her inside.
"The security guard was noise. But to exclude them, we have to investigate,” said Gerold Dompig, the police chief at the time.
Video footage then showed van der Sloot had lied. The Kalpoe brothers, also arrested, were never charged and maintain their innocence.
Van der Sloot proved difficult to interrogate
Van der Sloot proved a difficult suspect. “Normally, underage suspects break down under interrogation,” Dompig said, but van der Sloot changed his story ‘I think 40 times’.
Without forensic evidence, police released van der Sloot on Sept. 3, 2005.
Arubans were annoyed with American media’s coverage
Fifth, many Arubans felt slighted by the coverage.
Journalist Dilma Arends Geerman called it ‘disappointing’ that American media suggested the island was doing nothing.
Tour guide Alberto Groeneveldt told Fox News in 2023 that tourism on Aruba had taken a major hit following Holloway's disappearance, with clubs closing and fewer cruise ships stopping at the island.
Van der Sloot's emails to Natalee's mother
In 2010, Beth's attorney, John Q. Kelly, allegedly received an email from van der Sloot saying, “I will take you to Natalee. In return, I want to receive $250,000.”
A follow-up email 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."
After Kelly paid part of it, van der Sloot claimed her body lay in the foundation of a house under construction in 2005, but Kelly and the FBI found it was not.
Natalee's friends were angry when van der Sloot was jailed for another murder
Before extortion charges could follow, van der Sloot was jailed in Peru, pleading guilty in 2012 to murdering 21-year-old Stephany Flores Ramírez.
Greer said, “I remember being angry. This could have been prevented.”
Van der Sloot told an FBI agent he decapitated a rabbit
After van der Sloot was extradited to Birmingham, Alabama, in 2023, retired FBI agent Alexandra Montilla, who was on the flight, claimed he told her he ripped the head off a rabbit after it scratched his daughter.
Weather conditions made van der Sloot's 2023 confession more plausible
Under a polygraph, van der Sloot confessed to bludgeoning Natalee to death on a beach and said he waded three yards into the ocean to dispose of her body.
Polygraph examiner Michael Leverock said that sounded wrong until he learned of an ‘offshore wind’ in the area.
Otherwise, he said, the body would just wash up to shore.
Topics: True crime, Netflix
Thomas Bamford
