Saturday June 11, 2005

Aruba police: Suspect leading us to scene

ORANJESTAD, Aruba: One of three young men who took a missing Alabama honors student to the beach confessed that "something bad'' happened to the 18-year-old American, police say.

Deputy Police Commissioner Gerold Dompig told The Associated Press that one of the men admitted that "something bad has happened he confessed'' and was leading police late Friday night to the scene.

He refused to identify which young man had made the statement in the disappearance of 18-year-old Natalee Holloway, who was in the Dutch Caribbean island of Aruba to celebrate her graduation from a Mountain Brook High School, near Birmingham.

A 17-year-old Dutch boy and his two Surinamese friends, identified by defense lawyer David Kock as his client, Satish Kalpoe, 18, and his brother, Deepak, 21, had told police they took Holloway to Arashi Beach, on the northern tip of the island, in the early hours of May 30.

According to their testimony, they didn't get out of the car. Instead, Holloway and the Dutch teen, an honors student at Aruba International School, "were in the back seat kissing'' in an intimate embrace.

The testimony was reviewed by the court-appointed lawyer for one of two former hotel security guards being held in the case.

According to the testimony, they told police that they dropped Holloway at her Holiday Inn Hotel around 2 a.m., and last saw her being approached by a man in a black security guard uniform before they drove off.

Holloway disappeared while on a five-day trip with 124 classmates and seven chaperones. Police found her U.S. passport and packed bags in her hotel room.

The brothers told police the young woman was drunk and refused to get out of the car when asked to, said Noraina Pietersz, who is representing 30-year-old Nick John, a former security guard arrested Sunday.

The three young men said Holloway stumbled in the parking lot of the hotel but refused help from her Dutch escort, Kock told The Associated Press.

Kock said the brothers told police they last saw Holloway being approached by a man in a security guard uniform before they drove off.

Holiday Inn employees say security cameras did not record Holloway's return. In addition, a Holiday Inn guard who worked the overnight shift the day the young woman disappeared said he did not see the high school graduate, said Pietersz, who said she also reviewed the guard's testimony to police.

In Mountain Brook, Alabama, Holloway's aunt, Marcia Twitty, expressed frustration that Aruban authorities initially released the three young men last week after questioning them.

"These are the last three guys to be with her, and we just feel like they know something,'' said Twitty, who is serving as the spokeswoman.

The criticism came after Holloway's stepfather, George "Jug'' Twitty, told the AP the young men told him that Holloway had been flirting with the Dutch student. Police Superintendent Jan van der Straaten said at a news conference that Holloway and the Dutch teen had met two days earlier at the casino of her hotel.

John and Abraham Jones, 28, a fellow former security guard, have been detained since Sunday. They are being held in separate locations on suspicion of murder and capital kidnapping, or kidnapping resulting in death, Pietersz said. None of the five has been charged. - AP

News

Aruba police: Suspect leading us to scene