Aruba police official: Suspect confesses to killing missing teen
Saturday, June 11, 2005 Posted: 12:03 AM EDT (0403 GMT)
ORANJESTAD, Aruba (CNN) -- One of three young suspects arrested Thursday in the investigation into the disappearance of an Alabama teenager has confessed to her murder, a senior police official said late Friday.
The suspect has agreed to lead police to the body of 18-year-old Natalee Holloway, the police official said.
Police did not say which of the three teenagers confessed.
The three have been identified as brothers Satish Kalpoe, 18, and Depak Kalpoe, 21, and their friend, 17-year-old Joran Van Der Sloot, the son of a judge.
The three, taken into custody early Thursday, were the last people to have reported seeing the missing student.
Police said Van Der Sloot met Holloway May 29 at the casino in the Holiday Inn where she was staying. The Birmingham, Alabama, student was in Aruba with classmates celebrating their high school graduation.
Later that night, Holloway went to a popular nightclub, Carlos'N Charlie's, with about 40 of her classmates. She left around 1:30 a.m. on May 30 with the Kalpoes and Van Der Sloot, authorities said.
Holly Brown, a Holloway friend who was at the club that night, said she found Van Der Sloot to be "very different."
"He lied about his age, and when we went on the [Carlos 'N Charlie's] Web site, we found pictures of him there one week before at the same place, wearing the same clothes," Brown told CNN.
In interviews with police, the three men acknowledged leaving the bar with Holloway. They told police they visited a beach before taking her back to her hotel about 2 a.m.
According to police statements, the Kalpoe brothers described her as stumbling on the way into the hotel, possibly as a result of alcohol, and that a "dark-colored" man in a black T-shirt with a radio helped her.
That testimony led to Sunday's arrest of Abraham Jones, 28, and Mickey John, 30, two security guards at a hotel near where Holloway was staying.
But a Holiday Inn employee who has reviewed surveillance tapes from that morning said the tapes do not show any sign of Holloway. Authorities had no explanation and were looking at whether the five men have any connections to each other.
The guards' attorneys maintain the two are innocent.
None of the five men have been formally charged.
Van Der Sloot's mother said she was confident her son had told authorities everything and that he was innocent.
"He was willing to help with anything, and he had a kind of quiet resolve -- I mean he said, 'Mom, don't be upset because everything will be fine. I know I am innocent, I didn't do anything,'" Anita Van Der Sloot told CNN.
"And in a very almost naive way he was very open with us, told us everything what happened," she said, adding that he has offered to speak with the Holloway family.
Government officials have said solving Holloway's disappearance is a national priority on the small Caribbean island where tourism is a top industry.
A massive search operation has involved authorities, family, friends and volunteers.
CNN's Karl Penhaul and Rick Sanchez contributed to this report.
