Amsterdam, Netherlands – A man who was re-arrested in the disappearance of Natalee Holloway tells a Dutch newspaper he would have liked to have the case go to trial.
20-year-old Joran van der Sloot was re-arrested in November for a new interrogation about the Alabama teen who vanished in Aruba in 2005. But public prosecutors on the island closed their investigation December 18th, saying they believed Holloway was dead but that they didn't have enough evidence to prosecute van der Sloot or two other former suspects. All three deny involvement.
Van der Sloot tells the newspaper DAG he "would have liked to have seen a trial so that everything could be out in the open." He says there was no new evidence indicating he was involved, as prosecutors had said. He says he thinks the arrest was a way to please the American media.
Holloway was on a high school graduation trip to the island when she vanished May 30th, 2005, hours before she was to return home to Mountain Brook. Extensive searches of the island turned up no trace of her.
(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)