Portrait of a Monster: Joran Van Der Sloot, a Murder in Peru, and the Natalee Holloway Mystery (30 page)

“In front of the Marriott were various couples. On our way to the Fisherman’s Hut, Natalee and I encountered one other couple. Where Natalee and I were, there was no one else.

“Natalee and I were there from 1:50
A.M.
to about an hour later. Satish picked me up before 2:50
A.M.
”

“Joran, we have three witnesses who claim to have been fishing where you say you brought Natalee that night,” Detective Erasmus divulged. “They said they didn’t see you there. Can you explain this?”

“They are lying,” Joran said. “I’ve got a better one for you. From now on, I’m exercising my right to silence.”

Joran refused to sign his statement that day. He told the officers he had already given several statements and was done cooperating. He informed them he was not willing to participate in any more field trips with investigators.

“It’s enough!” Joran exclaimed.

On July 4, Joran, Deepak, and Satish were transported to the courthouse in Oranjestad to go before a judge. Their most recent eight-day detention had expired and prosecutors were asking to hold all three men for another sixty days.

Judge Rick Smid was brought from Curaçao to preside over the closed hearing that Monday. After listening to the prosecution’s arguments, the judge ruled that there wasn’t sufficient evidence to hold Deepak and Satish Kalpoe any longer and ordered their release from jail. No travel restrictions were placed on the brothers.

Beth Twitty was irate. At a news conference later that day, Natalee’s mother told reporters, “My greatest fear is that they will leave Aruba. These criminals are now free to walk among the tourists of Aruba while I have not seen my beautiful daughter in thirty-six days. I am asking all nations not to offer them a safe haven.”

While the Kalpoe brothers were free to go home, the judge ruled that Joran, who was seemingly the last person to see Natalee alive, could be held for another sixty days while police continued their investigation.

Back in his cell at the Korrectie Instituut Aruba, Joran was given writing materials and began keeping a journal. “I’m tired, sad, upset and angry all at the same time,” he began. He complained about time passing. “I can’t grasp how they cannot find Natalee, dead or alive.” He was heartened that he had a lawyer. Joran wrote that he was pleased that he could no longer be questioned without his lawyer to relieve some of the pressure. “Sometimes the pressure is unbearable and you just want to tell them whatever they want so you can go back to your cell and sleep.”

He wrote about his promise to his parents to remain silent with the interrogators, noting that: “I have given fifteen statements, and I have told the same story more than ten times. All they are trying to do is trick me into saying something that isn’t true.”

When someone stole the milk and orange juice from his cell, he tried to calm himself down with a cigarette. “It really worked,” he wrote.

He outlined his life in jail by his daily schedule:

6:00
P.M.
–6:00
A.M.
: cells are locked.

6:00
A.M.
–10:00
A.M.
: cells are open, and there is a big hall for ping-pong, dominoes, or chess.

10:00
A.M.
–10:50
A.M.
: outside is available to play soccer or relax.

11:00
A.M.
–12:00
P.M.
: back in cells for lunch.

12:00
P.M.
–3:00
P.M.
: the hall is open again.

3:00
P.M.
–4:00
P.M.
: cells are locked to change guards.

4:00
P.M.
–4:50
P.M.
: outside again.

4:50
P.M.
–6:00
P.M.
: hall open for the last time. At 6:00
P.M.
back in cells “and the process repeats itself the next day.”

For the time being, Joran finally had structure, something his parents and psychologist had wanted for him. Meanwhile, Tim Miller and his team were panning the chaos of the hard, hostile Aruban landscape in the hopes of finding justice for Natalee.

EIGHTEEN

JUNE 2, 2010
LIMA, PERU

The afternoon air in Lima was thick with humidity. Heavy gray clouds blanketed the city as Richie Flores steered his BMW along Cangallo Street en route to the central morgue in the gritty downtown neighborhood of Santos. This was the second time in less than twenty-four hours that he had been asked to identify his baby sister’s corpse.

Earlier that morning, he had made the informal identification of Stephany’s body in Room 309 of the Hotel Tac. Now, a member of the family was required to come to the morgue to make the official identification, and again Stephany’s eldest brother had stepped forward.

Richie was exhausted. He had not slept in two days, and was in shock over his sister’s brutal murder. His father and Mariaelena were in mourning, and he and his younger brother, Enrique, had been busy making funeral arrangements and calling family members, relatives, and friends.

Mariaelena had lovingly packed a bag of clothing that she wanted her only daughter to wear before she was lain in the coffin.

Upon arriving at the Morgue Central de Lima, a colonial-style two-story building, Richie was led to a viewing area. The bag of clothing under his arm, he affirmed that the battered body lying on the steel gurney was Stephany’s. He related his stepmother’s request that his sister be buried in the clothes he had brought with him. But to his horror, her body was so bloated that the garments didn’t fit. Lab assistants at the morgue sympathetically dressed his sister in a hospital tunic for transport.

Shortly after 1:00
P.M.
that Wednesday, Dr. Juan Martin Villalobos signed off on the autopsy, and released Stephany’s remains to her family. His examination had concluded that the vibrant college senior had suffered a violent and protracted death. She had been choked, beaten, and finally smothered. These were details no family wanted to hear about a loved one.

“We are very sorry for your loss,” staff members told Richie, as he made his final departure from the morgue.

The family had planned a wake for later that evening at the Santísimo Nombre de Jesús, a Catholic church in the Floreses’ neighborhood of Chacarilla. The church was a beautiful concrete structure with a modern arched roof and glass façade on Calle Los Picaflores.

Mariaelena had told her husband that she was too distraught to attend the wake, so Ricardo had made arrangements with the funeral home to have the casket brought to the house. He wanted his wife to have an opportunity to say good-bye to their daughter.

The sun was beginning to set over Lima when the black hearse pulled into the family’s driveway. Ricardo was inside preparing some of Stephany’s belongings to take to the funeral home. He directed the driver to pull the hearse into the garage, wanting privacy. His wife needed to be able to lay her hands on her daughter’s casket and have a few minutes alone with her.

At the sight of her daughter’s coffin, Mariaelena was so overcome with emotion that she fainted. When she regained consciousness, she was more composed. To the surprise of everyone, she announced that she wanted to accompany Ricardo to the wake. Being in Stephany’s presence had given her renewed strength.

Ricardo was relieved and comforted. He hadn’t wanted to go to the wake without her. Still, he beseeched family and friends not to approach her with condolences during the service.

Hundreds of mourners lined up outside the church to pay their respects to the Flores family. Despite the darkness, Mariaelena emerged from the limousine wearing a pair of gold-framed sunglasses to conceal her red and swollen eyes. Ricardo Flores, dressed in a black suit, also hid behind dark sunglasses. He helped Mariaelena out of the car. She was visibly distressed and wobbly with grief. Her two sons, Ricardo Jr. and Bobby, supported her as they navigated through the crowd.

Ricardo remained on the street amid the crowd of mourners and photographers to supervise the removal of his daughter’s coffin from the hearse. The cherrywood casket bore copies of two color photos of Stephany taped to the top. In the photos, Stephany was a radiant and beautiful young lady, wearing a pink halter dress. She was holding two oversize stuffed animals, a huge white teddy bear in a red bib, and a brown bunny with a red velvet coat and a red bow. Her smile and her twinkling eyes were breathtaking.

The mourners included friends and classmates of Stephany as well as friends of Ricardo, powerful people in Lima’s political and social circles. Lima’s mayor, Luis Castañeda, and Peru’s minister of defense, Rafael Rey, were there, as well as Peruvian race-car rally legend, Henry Bradley.

The young woman so brutally murdered had touched the hearts of the Peruvian people. Like Natalee Holloway five years earlier, she had become everybody’s daughter and her funeral belonged to everyone.

The following morning, Stephany’s body was brought to the Jardines de la Paz for a graveside mass. The cemetery was in La Molina, one of Lima’s more upscale neighborhoods. The Jardines de la Paz cemetery spread over fifty acres in a pastoral location at the foothills of the Andes. Its grounds were carefully planted and manicured, an oasis of green in an otherwise barren landscape.

Stephany’s brothers accounted for four of the six pallbearers who pulled the casket from the hearse and rested it on their shoulders. The mood was as gloomy as the winter weather, gray and chilled, when suddenly, beams of sunlight broke through like a gentle gesture from heaven. The brothers carried the casket to its final resting place through a sea of mourners gathered for the event.

As she had for the wake, Mariaelena found the courage to accompany Ricardo to the burial. The couple relied on each other and had been inseparable since the tragedy. As difficult as it was going to be to see her daughter lowered into the earth, she would at least have Ricardo at her side.

News reporters were among the crowd, capturing the procession.

Lawn chairs had been set up around the burial site, and Ricardo and Mariaelena sat silently in the front row. Their expressions reflected unbearable pain. Mariaelena, distraught, sat clutching her daughter’s favorite stuffed animal, a Minnie Mouse.

During the service, her husband stood to lay two white roses on their daughter’s coffin. Stephany’s father had to remove his sunglasses to wipe away tears.

When the service was finished, Ricardo embraced Mariaelena and almost carried her to a car waiting nearby, ensconcing her in the backseat, and snapping his fingers at reporters to keep their distance. He returned to the burial site and stood with Richie, his eldest son, until cemetery workers had shoveled the last bit of dirt onto his daughter’s grave.

The idea of leaving before the end was out of the question. Stephany had been his best friend, his navigator, and his spiritual compass since the day she was born. His face was slicked with tears, his pain unfathomable.

“I love you, Stephany,” he whispered, brushing away tears.

In the middle of the burial mass, Ricardo was informed that Joran van der Sloot, his daughter’s alleged killer, had been apprehended in Chile. Those with faith in the Lord were confident He had played a role in bringing Joran into custody just as Stephany was being returned to the earth. Even nonbelievers rejoiced in this small miracle in an otherwise anguished day.

Members of the press had also learned about the arrest in Chile and wanted a reaction from the family. Ricardo was grateful for the press, knowing it had expedited the suspect’s capture. Throughout the course of events related to Stephany’s murder, the ranks of the press had seemed to multiply. Having to grieve so publicly had certainly been difficult, especially having so many cameras at the Jardines de la Paz.

Bolstered by the arrest, Ricardo tamped his grief enough to address the cameras. He poignantly used Stephany’s freshly filled grave as his backdrop. He thanked law enforcement for their professionalism throughout his family’s ordeal. He also begged political leaders on both sides of the border not to delay in returning Joran van der Sloot to Lima.

“The Peruvian authorities are doing everything they can to have this killer brought back to Peru,” Ricardo stated. “I don’t think they will extradite him because this will take too long.

“Since he is wanted in Peru, I am sure that the Ministry of Interior will send a delegation to see that he is brought back immediately.”

Choking back tears, the elder Flores closed his brief statement with thoughts of Natalee Holloway’s family. “At long last this girl from Aruba is going to rest in peace,” he declared. “She was brutally assassinated just like my daughter was.”

Ricardo vowed not to sleep until Stephany’s alleged killer was back on Peruvian soil and signed off with a slight nod.

Security guards protected him as he left the impromptu news conference and slid into the backseat of the limousine beside Mariaelena. He cradled his wife, who was still shocked in grief, as she clutched the pink Minnie Mouse. He offered her water from a plastic bottle and gently stroked her arm.

The limousine pulled away from the remaining mourners and reporters as Mariaelena was burying her face in Ricardo’s chest.

The Flores family had buried their daughter, Stephany, but the Holloways were still searching for Natalee. Five years had passed since her disappearance and they were making no progress.

NINETEEN

JULY 5, 2005
ORANJESTAD, ARUBA

Meanwhile, Beth Twitty’s road to justice for Natalee was giving her no traction. Leads generated by the tremendous publicity were going nowhere. The day before, a judge had ordered the release of two more detainees, the Kalpoe brothers, on the grounds that the evidence against them was not enough to keep them in jail.

Beth Twitty held a two-minute news brief to express her outrage. “The two suspects who were released yesterday were involved in a violent crime against my daughter,” Beth decried, choking back tears. Referring to the two young men as “criminals,” she lamented that they were not only free to walk among the tourists and citizens of Aruba, but that the judge had imposed no travel restrictions, meaning they were also free to leave the island and travel to any destination in the world.