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Nancy Grace
The Night Natalee Holloway Disappeared
Aired December 24, 2010 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Tonight: What happened the night Natalee Holloway goes missing? We investigate the disappearance of Alabama beauty Natalee Holloway, missing from her high school senior trip, Aruba. For over five years, judge`s son Joran Van Der Sloot has taunted Natalee`s family, even profiting off the Alabama beauty`s death. But could reexamining what happened those first few days solve the mystery of Natalee`s disappearance?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): As police, military and rescue teams comb every inch of a small Caribbean island looking for a missing American teenager, her mother appeals directly to the girl.
BETH HOLLOWAY TWITTY, NATALEE`S MOTHER: Natalee, you can reach me on your cell phone. I have it, and it`s set up for international use now. And I also have my cell phone, and it`s set up for international use. So please call me.
TODD: FBI and Aruban officials tell CNN the FBI is helping investigate the disappearance of 18-year-old Natalee Holloway. She was on a trip to Aruba with more than 100 other seniors from Mountain Brook High School near Birmingham, Alabama, celebrating graduation. The celebration took them to a local bar late Sunday into Monday.
TWITTY: She was seen leaving Carlos `N Charlie`s at approximately 1:30 AM Monday morning.
TODD: Police and family members tell CNN at least 20 other students were with Holloway at the bar. Police say some of her classmates asked her to leave with them, but she chose to get in a car with three young men, all locals.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We find them and we talk to them as witnesses. Three young boys, they went to school, too. And we talk with them and we (INAUDIBLE) the investigation around them, too.
TODD: Police tell CNN the boys claim to have dropped Holloway off at her hotel between 1:30 and 2:00 o`clock AM on Monday. That`s the last time she was seen. Police have released the young men for now and are reluctant to characterize how they view them in the investigation. They say they hope to make an arrest soon.
Back home, friends and family are looking for any break in the case.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We just want everybody to keep praying for Natalee because we know she`s going to come home. She`s a strong girl and she`ll get through this, and she knows that we`re all praying for her and we`re here for her, waiting for her to come back.
TODD: Police say there`s a slight chance Holloway could have left the island, but her passport was found in her hotel room. And there`s a key question about supervision. Family members say about 150 kids were on the trip with at least 10 chaperones. Holloway`s stepfather tells CNN the chaperones bear no responsibility for what happened, but the bar owner tells CNN there were no chaperones at the establishment in the early hours of Monday morning when Holloway and some 20 other kids were partying there.
A friend who was at the bar that night has only a slightly different account.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was a chaperone there.
TODD: Holloway`s parents are offering a reward for her safe return.
KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Neon lights pull in the gamblers and the curious. Drawn by the ringing of quarters in the slot machine, a spin at the roulette wheel, the roll of the dice.
JAN VAN DER STRAATEN, CHIEF POLICE COMMISSIONER, ARUBA: They meet each other in the casino.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That day or (INAUDIBLE)
VAN DER STRAATEN: The day before.
PENHAUL: Police say Natalee Holloway was here in the Holiday Inn casino in Saturday night, May 28th. It was her first known contact with one of the suspect, Joran Van Der Sloot, the 17-year-old son of an Aruban judge. More neon lights, this time outside Carlos `N Charlie`s bar. Holloway came here to party the following Sunday night. She was with high school friends. She may not have realized she was taking a gamble of different kind.
The bar is in Aruba`s capital, Oranjestad, about 15 minutes` drive from the Holiday Inn where Holloway and her classmates were staying.
Joran Van Der Sloot and brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe showed up about 10:45, according to statements the Kalpoes made to investigators and seen by the defense attorney for another man who`s now been cleared of links to Natalee Holloway`s disappearance.
CHRIS LEJUEZ, ATTORNEY FOR ABRAHAM JONES: And one of them stated that Joran danced with her.
PENHAUL: According to police, it was around 1:00 AM, closing time early Monday, when Natalee Holloway friends watched her walk out of the bar and into a silver gray car with Van Der Sloot and the Kalpoe brothers.
What we know about what happened next comes from those who have read the Kalpoe brothers` statements.
LEJUEZ: After they got in the car, one of them says she wanted to see the other side of the island, and the other one says she wanted to see -- to go have a look at the sharks.
PENHAUL: You can make it to the lighthouse from Carlos `N Charlie`s in around 20 minutes. The Kalpoe were said to be up front, Holloway and Van Der Sloot in the back.
LEJUEZ: They say that he was not only kissing her but fondling her sexually.
PENHAUL: It`s called California Lighthouse. It`s a tourist attraction by day, by night an isolated romantic rendezvous. It`s not clear the car even stopped. But even in the moonlight, from here, it would have been tough for Holloway to see any sharks.
LEJUEZ: One says they drove by the lighthouse. The other one said they did not get out of the car.
PENHAUL: As they looked back around, they would have passed Arashi beach. Experts say if you dump an object here, the current will drag it west toward open ocean. According to Lejuez, the suspects` statements deny stopping at the beach. But the area was searched shortly after Holloway`s disappearance.
From Aruba`s northwest tip, Lejuez says the Kalpoe brothers` statement describes heading back to the Holiday Inn.
LEJUEZ: One of them states that she fell asleep and they had to wake her up to ask her at what hotel she was staying.
PENHAUL: When they dropped off Holloway, Lejuez quotes the statement of one of the Kalpoe brothers saying she was drunk and stumbled from the car. The other statement, Lejuez says, describes Holloway talking to a security guard dressed in black pants and a T-shirt. Based on the statements, two security guards, Mickey John and Abraham Jones, were arrested six days after Holloway went missing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do nothing, feel nothing.
PENHAUL: They were released after prosecutors decided there was no hard evidence against them. Van Der Sloot and the Kalpoe brothers were arrested around dawn. Prosecutors formally accused them of murder one, murder two and kidnapping leading to death. But Dutch law is different from American law, and they`ve not yet been formally charged.
Defense lawyers for the three young men maintain their clients` innocence.
DAVID KOCK, SATISH KALPOE`S ATTORNEY: My client is maintaining that he is innocent.
PENHAUL: Law enforcement sources close to the investigation say cracks are appearing in Van Der Sloot and the Kalpoe`s stories, a view shared by one of the freed security guards, who spoke to Deepak Kalpoe in jail.
MICKEY JOHN, FORMER SUSPECT: He told me that the story about dropping the girl at Holiday Inn was all made up. He dropped the Dutch guy with the missing girl close to the Marriott, and he and his brother went home.
PENHAUL: Those law enforcement sources say their accounts may be murky and their description of the facts not quite the same. But one indisputable fact -- Natalee Holloway is missing, without trace.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Karl Penhaul, CNN correspondent, is with us in Aruba. Karl, there are murmurings to that exact issue, that these two security guards are being targeted, while the actual guys that were with her, that took her away from the restaurant have been set free. Explain. Why are these two being held? Did they run into the girl after the other three let her go? I mean, why are they being held and the other three have been let go? Is it true they are from rich or influential families, while these two are not?
PENHAUL: That`s the question on a lot of people`s lips right now, Nancy. We`ve been talking around -- we`ve also been talking to the suspects` families. A number of answers to that. The three young men last seen in the company of Natalee Holloway outside Carlos `N Charlie`s we understand were never arrested, were never detained by police. Yes, they were interviewed, but the police in a press conference earlier this week have said that no evidence in terms of the car that they all drove away in was confiscated at any stage.
Meanwhile, the two suspects, three of their vehicles have been confiscated, one of the suspect`s mother`s cars, a cousin`s car, I believe, and one of the cars belonging to one of the suspects. Those are being looked at, even though there`s nothing, apparently, according to the defense attorneys, in any witness statement to suggest that Natalee Holloway was ever seen in the company of these two suspects, let alone got in their cars.
As far as the identities of the three people, the young men that are being named or were named as persons of interest, indeed, they do seem to be from influential families, certainly, middle class families. A little difficult in this context to spell out exactly whom they are. But what the mother of Mickey John -- Antonius John, but Mickey, his mother calls him -- what she says is that here what is at stake or what part of the problem is, is that there`s a race issue here because the people -- the three young men are of influential middle class, largely white families, descendants of the Dutch colonizers that once came here, whereas the two suspects are from black immigrant families who maybe have been here for many years, but nevertheless are still regarded as immigrants. And so the mother of one of the defendants says that she believes that there is a color, a race issue here at stake here, as well.
GRACE: Karl, did either of the three young men who took Natalee from the bar that night ever tell police that they had slept with her, had sex with her?
PENHAUL: We haven`t heard that directly because the evidence here and the witness statements here are highly confidential. The defense attorneys have seen some of those witness statements, I understand. But I do understand that in the file, there are not three witness statements. I understand there are possibly only two witness statements. We do hear from police sources, however, that the three men -- at least one of them says that they did go to the beach with Natalee and had some fun. The interpretation of that I`m not aware of, Nancy.
GRACE: Now, is this coming from the defense attorneys?
PENHAUL: That final bit of information was from a police source that the three men, or one of the three men, at least, had said that they had gone to the beach with Natalee after leaving Carlos `N Charlie`s and had some fun. They didn`t specify what "had some fun" meant, but the beach where the two had gone or where the group had gone had been searched. That I believe is called Arashi beach.
GRACE: So far, Karl Penhaul, the island is 19.6 miles long. It`s 6 miles wide. It has been searched by police, by the FBI, by the citizens. They were given a half a day holiday to look for Natalee. And you would think that in this geographic area, if a body was there, it would have been found, although it`s sitting right in the middle of the ocean. There`s that possibility too, Karl.
PENHAUL: Well, there have been a number of developments on the search front, in fact, Nancy, because the FBI specialist dive team -- you`ll remember that that was requested and that was going to be brought in. It was brought in. But those divers never dived, and those divers have now left, according to our FBI contact. And the reason they left is because no area was ever pinpointed for them to search.
We`ve also talked to Aruba search and rescue teams. They have been doing their own thing, basically. Normally, they take the lead from the government in order to pinpoint certain areas where they can search, but the government ministries are no longer providing them with any area to search because most of the public areas have now been searched. So that throws up the question where to search now.
GRACE: Karl, wait a minute. You told me the divers left without putting a toe in the water. Is that correct?
PENHAUL: Not a toe, not a flipper, Nancy.
GRACE: OK, wait a minute! Wait!
PENHAUL: They haven`t been in the water.
GRACE: Wait! And you`re saying it`s because they don`t know which part of the beach to search? Why don`t they try starting with the beach where the guys say they took her?
PENHAUL: Again, I`m not privy to that kind of information. But what one of the search and rescue team members did explain was that he would have expected the dive teams to be diving off some of the craggy shorelines where the currents are strongest, the currents that are being channeled in through that narrow stretch of sea between the southern coast of Aruba and the northern coast of Venezuela.
But again, they`re also here as guests of Aruba. They can`t operate independently. And the FBI contacts said it`s because the government of Aruba hasn`t pinpointed the areas where they should be searching. That`s why they didn`t go in the water. That`s why they`ve now left, Nancy.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He was Joran Van Der Sloot`s biggest defender. Paulus Van Der Sloot has suddenly died in Aruba, potentially revving up the Natalee Holloway investigation.
TWITTY: I fully believe that he knows exactly where Natalee`s body is. I do know that Paul Van Der Sloot -- yes. Yes. I know he knows.
DAVE HOLLOWAY, NATALEE`S FATHER: Nothing was done right in the beginning on this thing. Otherwise, we`d have an answer.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Also, at the time Natalee Holloway went missing, Paulus Van Der Sloot was training as a judge and was reportedly influential within the Aruba establishment and legal community.
HOLLOWAY: Meeting with the prosecutor, did you search Paulus`s home? And she said no. And I said, Why? She said, Because he wouldn`t let us.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Paul Van Der Sloot had many friends within the police department. He had many friends within the department of justice. And he had many friends -- and he was friendly with all the judges in Aruba.
TWITTY: It`s kind of frightening to us to hear about his connections, with the father having control of security cameras on the island, because after all, the Holiday Inn security cameras were not working that night that the suspects took Natalee.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In a television interview, Joran Van Der Sloot says his father gave Aruban police $50,000 as a bribe to look the other way, a statement Joran Van Der Sloot has since said was a lie.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: It was her last night in Aruba, and Natalee Holloway and her friends headed to a local hot spot, Carlos and Charlie`s. But just before she was to fly back to Alabama the next morning, Natalee was seen leaving in a car with judge`s son Joran Van Der Sloot and his friends, brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Reeling from the release of two more suspects, the parents of Natalee Holloway continue to pressure an Aruban investigation they believe has gone nowhere.
TWITTY: I am asking this in the name of my beautiful, intelligent and outstanding daughter, who I haven`t seen for 36 days and for whom I will continue to search until I find her.
MATTINGLY: Without explanation, a judge in Aruba Monday released brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe after 26 days of interrogation.
TWITTY: Help me by not allowing these two to get away with this crime. It is my greatest fear today that the Kalpoe brothers will leave Aruba.
MATTINGLY: An attorney for the Kalpoe brothers maintains their innocence and says they have no intention of leaving the island. Even though Aruban law does permit them to travel, the Kalpoe family has canceled long-standing plans to travel to their native Surinam.
RUDY DOMEN, DEEPAK KALPOE`S ATTORNEY: Usually, in cases like this, is that the longer you detain somebody, the stronger your evidence should be. But in this case, my clients` case, it was the other way around. The longer they stayed in detention, the more proof came out that they didn`t have to do anything with the disappearance itself.
MATTINGLY: Officially, the brothers are still suspects and can be taken back into custody if new evidence surfaces. After changing their original story that Natalee was dropped off at her hotel, they eventually told authorities they drove Natalee and 17-year-old Joran Van Der Sloot from a nightclub to a beach, where they last saw the couple together. Defense attorneys tell CNN local fishermen told investigators they did not see such a couple, but they did spot a white Suzuki on the beach that night. A white Suzuki was one of the vehicles confiscated during a search of the Van Der Sloot home.
KOCK: That they had seen a Jeep type of car during -- in that timeframe, that stayed for about 30 to 40 minutes. That was the only thing that they saw that was abnormal for that day.
MATTINGLY: The relentless question of what happened to the young blond honor student once seemed to be a puzzle that was coming together. But the puzzle that has at times involved two former security guards, three young island men, a local deejay and an Aruban judge, has come apart piece by piece.
For now, the investigation seems to focus entirely on the 17-year-old son of an island judge. A handcuffed Joran Van Der Sloot took investigators on Sunday to the beach where he claims he left Holloway alone and alive.
But the same judge who ordered the release of the Kalpoe brothers also ordered the teen to remain behind bars for up to 60 more days, meaning possibly two more months of lengthy interrogations and official silence in a mystery that seems less and less likely to produce a happy ending.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PENHAUL (voice-over): Aruba`s just a speck, 19 miles long, 6 miles wide and 20 miles from Venezuela. But once you get airborne, you see the scale of the task facing search teams -- the high-rise hotel district where Natalee stayed, along the coast to the lighthouse, the possible route Natalee took with three young men now being held in connection with her disappearance. Beyond that, miles of soft sand dunes.
RUBEN CROES, SEARCH & RESCUE TEAM MEMBER: It`s not the first time that they have found bodies in the dunes here on the north shore, but it has to do with people getting lost.
PENHAUL (on camera): When was the last time they found bodies in the dunes?
CROES: I think they found some guy, like, five years ago.
PENHAUL: And how long did it actually take to find the body?
CROES: I think he was -- he was missing for probably another five years before that.
PENHAUL (voice-over): Teams have hunted here for signs of Natalee, but the wind and sand quickly obscure traces of anything that may be buried. Beyond that, the sea stretches to the horizon. It`s 690 miles due west to Panama. Any object that drifts off Aruba`s west coast will eventually end up in Panama.
We head out on the search and rescue boat to Manchebo Point, notorious because this is where two powerful ocean currents collide.
EFRAIN BOEKHUODT, SEARCH & RESCUE TEAM COORDINATOR: Once you reach a certain point, that really (INAUDIBLE) you get yourself in the current, and here`s where most of the problems happen that once you get in the current, it`s just about two miles an hour on a slow day.
PENHAUL: Any closer to shore, he says, and the surf could drag an object back to the beach. But here, with more than a mile-and-a-half off Aruba`s west coast, the water is more than 60 feet deep. We`re going to test those currents.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Three, two, one.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. Man overboard!
PENHAUL: Here you can feel a menacing undertow and a strong swell. Boekhuodt tells me if they leave me in the water long enough, I`ll drift northwest a few miles, then due west out into open ocean.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
PENHAUL: But he says it would not be easy to sail a boat out this far at night to dump something.
BOEKHUODT: If you put a foot in the water at night, you`re on the radar.
PENHAUL: Crews say search teams have scanned most of the island, but he thinks more specialized manpower and detection equipment is necessary.
BOEKHUODT: It`s not the first time somebody`s lost and we cannot find them. But it`s still surprising that on the island itself, with the massive search we have had -- it`s like vanishing in thin air.
PENHAUL: And as time goes on with still no clues, Croes voices his darkest fears.
CROES: We search sometimes for over three weeks. Sometimes we don`t find anything.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: It took six months undercover for 34-year-old Patrick Van Der Eem to gain the trust of judge`s son Joran Van Der Sloot. But finally, inside an SUV, Van Der Sloot in his own words confesses to what he claims happened to Natalee. Unbeknownst to him, high-tech secret surveillance cameras were along for the ride.
What we saw on video -- and we`re about to show you more of that secretly video -- audiotape of Joran Van Der Sloot confessing to being with Natalee the night she died. This wasn`t all in one night, everybody. This was taken over months and months, weeks of driving around, yes, smoking pot. And he stuck with the same story for weeks on end.
He mentioned being there on the beach when Natalee went into convulsions 10 separate times, Tracy Sabo. It`s not as if he got high and drunk on one occasion and came up with a fabrication. This was something - - a story he maintained over months.
TRACY SABO, CNN PRODUCER (via telephone): That`s true. That`s what we`ve been told. And another interesting thing to point out is when these videotapes first surfaced, it was clearly a surprise to Joran Van Der Sloot, and his first defense was to call in to a local Dutch television broadcast. And he said publicly on the air that he was lying, he made this up because he knew that this Dutch crime reporter wanted something, and so he made up some lies to give him something to investigate.
But clearly, today we`re hearing a different story. He`s now saying that in some capacity, he didn`t know of what he was speaking and that he was under the influence at the time.
GRACE: Take a listen to what Joran Van Der Sloot said when police weren`t listening.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): How do you know she`s dead, Joran?
JORAN VAN DER SLOOT, (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): I just know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): How did you see it? Did you feel her pulse? Did it go in one time?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): I just touched her, and there wasn`t anything anymore. It was over.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Did you try to resuscitate her?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): I tried everything. I even lifted her up. And at one time, Patrick, it was just like in the movies. This is what she did.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Shaking?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): Yes, very much. So I said to myself (EXPLETIVE DELETED) what is going on?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): What did you do then?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): So I stayed with her. There was nobody there, Patrick.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Of course there was nobody there. It was night, Joran.
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): So I was talking to her, talking to her, talking to her, and she didn`t say nothing. Nothing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): How long was she shaking for? Do you know what that is?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): I don`t know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): An epileptic attack or so?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): I don`t know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): She was shaking? Was there foam coming out of her mouth?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): No, no foam coming out of her mouth. I didn`t see that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: I want to go out to Jossy Mansur, managing director of "Diario" magazine there in Aruba. Jossy, welcome. At this juncture, after the people of Aruba have seen Joran Van Der Sloot`s confession, as far as I see it, and more -- the Dutch version was much more in depth than what we saw here in America -- what is their response?
JOSSY MANSUR, MANAGING DIRECTOR, "DIARIO" (via telephone): Well, over here, they find that he is guilty. Most of the people we`ve consulted, most of the people that have called us and has a reaction find that he was very articulate, that he didn`t seem to be under any kind of drug influence, that he was talking freely, that he collected his thoughts so much so that he could describe in detail what happened when he was with Natalee and Natalee died in his arms, and that he called a friend and threw her in the ocean.
The people of Aruba now are very, very irritated with this character, so much so that the minister of justice today declared him persona non grata in Aruba.
GRACE: With me here on the set is a lady that has been an inspiration to thousands of people. Not only has she never given up in the search for justice for her daughter, Natalee Holloway, but she is now a tireless victims` rights advocate. With me tonight, Beth Holloway. This is Natalee`s mother.
We`re taking your calls live. Beth, thank you for being with us.
BETH HOLLOWAY TWITTY, NATALEE`S MOTHER: Thank you, Nancy.
GRACE: Do you ever get just completely worn out with talking about this? Does it rake up the coals every time you talk about it?
TWITTY: Oh, I`ll be honest, Nancy. There was a time when, yes, it just -- I felt like, How can I continue to do this? And where am I going and what am I getting? I just felt like I wasn`t getting anywhere. But you know what? All that steady, constant, every day steps that we took, each one was well worth it because look where we are today. I never thought I`d see this time come to where you and I would be sitting here with such absolutely amazing revelations and information, you know, coming from Joran himself.
GRACE: When De Vries told you he had new evidence, did he tell you what it was, or did he just fly you over there and you saw it for the first time? Because I saw the video of you seeing it for the first time.
HOLLOWAY: Yes.
GRACE: And you were so composed. I believe that you had to know something because you were so composed as you were watching.
HOLLOWAY: Well, what he did was, he kind of -- it was great how he presented this. I mean, he first just contacted me initially and just asked me to come. You know, no questions asked. I just said, When do you want me there? And the next thing he did, which really was great, is he sat me down and explained to me about what I was going to see. He didn`t just hit me with it. He really did it an utmost professional manner possible. And I just think he just respected, you know, me as an individual and what I was about to hear.
So he did a step-by-step process, and then we went in to the actual viewing of the video. So I knew what I was going to see. He prepared me well for what I was about to see. But of course, you still can`t get the full scope of it because now I was able to see it and hear it.
GRACE: Exactly.
HOLLOWAY: But he was very considerate in how he presented it.
GRACE: I just want to ask you -- you know more than anybody, and I recall you and I talking, oh, gosh, now over a year ago, and you know so much more than the rest of us know about the investigation. What are the inconsistencies that you have seen in his various stories? I mean, I know he started off by telling you, I dropped her off at the Holiday Inn. Then he told somebody else he had sex with her on the beach. Then he just said, We caressed and she had convulsions and that she just died. There are so many inconsistencies.
HOLLOWAY: There are, but now that we`ve been able to hear these stunning admissions from Joran, we`ve been able to go back now and we can corroborate with some of the things that he`s admitting to Patrick, the informant in the car. We can bring it full circle and we can go back to the very beginning because it`s absolutely amazing some of the things that Joran is saying and admitting, even the condition that Natalee was in as he`s watching her suffer.
I mean, it`s stunning that 48 hours into Natalee`s disappearance, I was asked by an Aruban detective if Natalee has a history of seizures or epilepsy. And when -- and when I`m hearing Joran say that it looked like Natalee was having a seizure, and then he even -- what makes me sick and I want to come through the screen and kill him, when he imitates her, he imitates her as she`s suffering. And that`s in a video clip with Patrick.
GRACE: Yes, I mean, they drove around for days and days and days.
HOLLOWAY: Right.
GRACE: And what we saw were portions of all these days put together when he was talking about Natalee`s death.
HOLLOWAY: Right. And I`m so glad you brought that out when you began your show, is that this was not one incident where Joran gave this admission to Patrick, as you said. This was repeatedly over time, these same specific details. So you reiterated that. You make it clear that this was not just a one-time admission from Joran.
GRACE: A one-time, high-as-a-kite...
HOLLOWAY: Right. No.
GRACE: ... confession. He maintained this over a period of months.
HOLLOWAY: Correct.
GRACE: So what you just pointed out is very important. At the very, very beginning, police asked you, Does Natalee have a history of epilepsy or seizures?
HOLLOWAY: Right.
GRACE: And you didn`t know why they were asking. Do you now, in retrospect, believe that Joran Van Der Sloot told police that at the beginning?
HOLLOWAY: Well, you know, when you look at the facts, it`s pretty stunning that -- and when you have an investigator who asks you that question within the first 48 hours, when we go back, there were no other medical questions. I mean, he didn`t say, Does Natalee have diabetes, or Does Natalee have, you know, other medical issues.
(CROSSTALK)
HOLLOWAY: That was the only one. And they only asked me once, and I told them no. But they asked Jug, asked him probably about a dozen times, and Jug had to come to me at least half a dozen times, and I`d say, No. Why do they keep asking you that?
GRACE: Out to the lines. Karen in Nevada. Hi, Karen.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. You are a gift from God.
GRACE: Thank you. Would you tell the defense bar that, please? Thank you. What`s your question, dear?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have a comment and then a question. I don`t have a camcorder, but I would like to nominate Dave and Beth Holloway for extraordinary parents by proxy from Natalee. And my question is, since the Kalpoe brothers were also last seen with her and they lied initially that they had dropped her off, what do you think their motive was for lying in the beginning if they had no part in this whatsoever?
GRACE: You know, that`s a really good point, Karen in Nevada, because many people believe that Joran Van Der Sloot`s confession on videotape completely exonerates the Kalpoe brothers. But she`s right. They did lie and say they dropped her off at the Holiday Inn.
TWITTY: Well, several things come to mind when I think about that. And one, we have to go back to that Satish and Joran were in Carlos `N Charlie`s with Natalee. So we know that Joran -- we know that these individuals were in charge of Natalee`s drinks. They bought Natalee`s drinks. They paid for Natalee`s drinks. So we can`t help but wonder if the drug, the GHB perhaps was given to her by one of them at that moment.
And secondly, Joran during his conversations with Patrick -- I think this kind of sums it up. They -- when Joran got together with Deepak and reached out to him to help him establish that Holiday Inn drop-off, he even states that there was one thing that Joran was mad about, was he had no idea -- and he used some very explicit terms to describe Natalee -- the "F" and "B" word...
GRACE: He called her a bitch and a whore.
TWITTY: But the biggest -- and he also said the biggest problem is he had no idea the magnitude, he had no idea that the -- you know, the "F`ing" mother would never shut up and would never -- would have brought this so global. They had no idea what they were stepping into, Nancy -- they were stepping into. No idea.
GRACE: Whether he we come back, American tourists stumble across a human jawbone on that same Aruba beach.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: The night Natalee disappeared, even years later, keeps coming back to the beach. American tourists from Massachusetts stumble across a human jawbone on the same strip where Natalee last stayed. The couple takes that jawbone directly to the hotel front desk. It`s flown by two Aruban investigators to the NFI, the Netherlands Forensic Institute, for testing.
Straight out to Jean Casarez, joining us from the field, legal correspondent, "In Session." Jean, what do we know?
JEAN CASAREZ, "IN SESSION": Well, we know that Aruban forensic officials took this jawbone. They have confirmed that it is the jawbone, along with an attached tooth, of a Caucasian young female girl. It is in the hands of the Hague tonight, their Forensic Institute. They are trying to determine if it is that of Natalee Holloway. They have Holloway`s DNA at the Hague, and they will make that confirmation shortly.
GRACE: And Jean, isn`t it correct that this is found on the beach, the hotel strip where Natalee last stayed, which is consistent with everything we have known all along?
CASAREZ: That`s right. And what you`re saying is that all the statements of Joran Van Der Sloot saying that her body was taken out to the ocean, out to the water, dumped in the swamp, could be corroborated by this physical evidence.
GRACE: Well, surprise, surprise. It washed back to shore, Joran Van Der Sloot. Bet you didn`t count on that happening!
Straight out to Jossy Mansur, the managing director and publisher of "Diario." He`s joining us from Aruba. Jossy, what do you know about the discovery? Tell me everything you know.
MANSUR: Well, it`s big news here because everything seems to point to a link with the missing girl, Natalee Holloway. It belongs to a young Caucasian woman. It was found on the strip of beach where Joran admitted he asked a friend to dump Natalee`s body. I mean, the ocean was very rough. The waves came. They ate up some of the beach. But they returned a jawbone, a lower jawbone with one tooth in it.
The police acted immediately on it. It was found on Friday. On Sunday, two police officers traveled to Holland with it, and the tests are being done right now. And we may as soon as tomorrow know the results.
GRACE: Joining us, Jossy Mansur, the managing director and publisher of "Diario."
I want to go to Dr. Howard Oliver former deputy medical editor, forensic pathologist joining us out of LA. Doctor, my understanding is there`s at least -- which means more -- one tooth still attached to the jawbone. Where are they going to get DNA?
HOWARD OLIVER, FMR. DPTY. MEDICAL EXAMINER: They can get DNA from the pulp, the inner parts of the tooth.
GRACE: Explain.
OLIVER: Well, the pulp contains the nerves and some of the nutrient materials. It`s inside the tooth. It`s usually retained. It`s not destroyed by the water and the elements. They would have to break the tooth open to get to the pulp, though.
GRACE: And what we are hearing, Dr. Oliver, it`s going to be easier to get the DNA out of the interior of the tooth, as opposed to out of the jawbone. Why?
OLIVER: There is -- the pulp is retained much better because of the enamel of the tooth protects the pulp.
GRACE: You know, Dr. Oliver, DNA shows up years and years and years later. In fact, now with new forensic techniques, we go back and look at cold cases that were 50 years ago, and there`s DNA there.
OLIVER: It should still be intact. And it`s protected by -- like I was saying previously, it`s protected by the enamel of the tooth, moreso than the bone marrow, which can dry out. But the enamel -- the pulp in the tooth stays relatively intact.
GRACE: You know, I can compare it to this, Christy, North Carolina. It`s like, of course, the nerve is dead, the tissue is dead. But compare it to dried blood. You can get DNA from dried blood. You would look at this jawbone and these teeth that are on it and it may look dead. It may look dry. And you wouldn`t think there`s any DNA in there. But think of dried blood. You can easily get a DNA match off dried blood.
To Ellie Jostad. What more can you tell me, Ellie?
ELLIE JOSTAD, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Well, Nancy, one of the reasons why this find is significant is that it matches up with one of the versions Joran Van Der Sloot gave about what happened that night. You remember the interview that was set up, hidden camera, by Peter De Vries, investigative journalist in the Netherlands. In that version, he told a friend of his that Natalee passed out or started shaking, had some kind of seizure while they were on the beach. He had a friend dump her body at sea. If that is what really happened, it is possible this has washed ashore from that incident.
GRACE: Now, hold on. Are you talking -- I`m getting all of his confessions confused, Ellie! OK, are you talking about...
JOSTAD: Me, too.
GRACE: ... the confession where he`s in the car with the German journalist and he talks about her dying on the beach?
JOSTAD: Right.
GRACE: Or are you talking about the one where he says she`s using alcohol and cocaine -- not true -- and she`s on a balcony and gets sick and trembles and falls off the balcony?
JOSTAD: Well, I`m talking about the first one you`re talking about, Nancy, where he said that her body was disposed at sea. But you bring up an interesting point. This area is also close to Bobali (ph) Puddle, which is another location he claims he dumped the body. It`s only a mile or so from there.
GRACE: Take a listen to Joran Van Der Sloot confessing to Natalee`s death.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): And one time, Patrick, it was just like in the movies. This is what she did.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Shaking?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): Yes, very much. So I said to myself, (EXPLETIVE DELETED) what is going on?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): What did you do then?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): So I stayed with her. There was nobody there, Patrick.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Of course there was nobody there. It was night, Joran.
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): So I was talking to her, talking to her, talking to her, and she didn`t say nothing. Nothing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): So how long was she shaking for? Do you know what that is?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): I don`t know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): An epileptic attack or so?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): I don`t know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): She was shaking? Was there foam coming out of her mouth?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): No, no foam coming out of her mouth. I didn`t see that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: OK. Ellie, where at that time is he saying he was on the beach in relation to where this jawbone has been found?
JOSTAD: Right. Well, he said that he and Natalee are on the beach. I believe he says they were kissing, and she suddenly goes into some kind of seizure. He says that he couldn`t tell if she was alive or dead. He called a friend of his, that they wrote -- that the friend actually took the body out to sea in a boat very near this -- he says, you know, they were on this strip by all the hotels in Aruba, and that`s the strip where this bone was found.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just how does Joran Van Der Sloot claim the evening started the last night of Natalee Holloway`s life?
Here`s what Van Der Sloot said happened. He left a bar with Natalee at 1:00 AM. The Kalpoe brothers dropped them at a beach near her hotel. He said he had sex with Natalee there, but then she started shaking horribly, and then he said, quote, "There was nothing."
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): How do you know she`s dead, Joran?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): I just know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): How did you see it? Did you feel her pulse? Did it go in one time?
VAN DER SLOOT (through translator): I just touched her, and there wasn`t anything anymore. It was over.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Will there finally be justice for Natalee?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Aruban authorities questioned Van Der Sloot in the Netherlands. That was several days after a Dutch TV program aired video of Van Der Sloot saying Holloway was dead and that he had a friend dump her body at sea.
GRACE: On a national TV interview, he says that he sold her into the sex trade.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Joran Van Der Sloot`s already told four or five different stories about what happened. So what if he comes and tells a sixth story?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Claiming the 18-year-old high school student died suddenly while they were making out on the beach a Aruba. All of a sudden, what she did was like in a movie. She was shaking. It was awful, he says, and I prodded her. There was nothing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How many times does this person have to confess before something is done?
HOLLOWAY: I think that his pattern is, is that he will continue talking. But will he eventually be arrested and convicted and placed in jail for what he said? Whether we get the justice Natalee deserves, that`s the ultimate (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Van Der Sloot describes calling a friend he says was never questioned by police, who had a boat nearby. Van Der Sloot says that they carried Natalee Holloway`s body to the boat.
TWITTY: We just have to, though, keep going, because the only way we will get justice for Natalee is if we do keep going. I mean, if we give up, absolutely nothing will happen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He went out to the sea and then he threw her out like a rag, he said. Van Der Sloot is heard on the tape saying neither he nor his friend were certain Natalee Holloway was dead.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Let`s stop and remember Army Private First Class Nils Thompson, just 19, Confluence, Pennsylvania, killed, Iraq, awarded Bronze Star and Purple Heart, buried with full military honors at Arlington. From an early age, he was drawn to the military. He loved G.I. Joe comic books and action figures, played soldiers in the woods with his friends. Spare time, loved fishing, riding his four wheeler. Remembered for optimism, humor. Lost his life just one day after his 19th birthday. He leaves behind grieving parents, Frances (ph) and Neil (ph), sister Lillian (ph), cousin Jeffrey (ph). Nils Thompson, American hero.
Thanks to our guests, but especially to you for being with us. And as we approach this miraculous day of Christmas, peace be with you as we welcome the prince of peace. Everyone, I`ll see you tomorrow night 8:00 o`clock sharp, Eastern. And until then, good night, friend.
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