Joran van der Sloot admitted to killing Natalee Holloway. The late 18-year-old went missing while on a high school senior trip in 2005 in Aruba. She was last seen drinking in a bar with the Dutch national on the island.

In October 2023, Joran accepted a plea deal and confessed to the murder. Natalee’s mother, Beth Holloway, gave a heartbreaking victim impact statement before the court, addressing Joran directly by saying, “For 19 years, you denied killing Natalee Holloway. Your lies have caused indiscernible pain. You have finally admitted that you murdered her. You are a killer, and I want you to remember that.”

Joran previously escaped justice in Natalee’s disappearance

Then 17, Joran was arrested on June 5, 2005 and considered the prime suspect in her murder. He was later released in September of that year due to lack of evidence. Her later admitted on syndicated TV show A Current Affair after he was released from jail that he’d been with Natalee the night she disappeared, but that he’d left her alone and alive on a beach.

Joran would be rearrested several times in the case

In subsequent years when possible new evidence would come to light, authorities would re-arrest Joran but would set him free when the case continued to stall. He was eventually sued by Natalee’s parents, Dave and Beth, for personal injury after the pain they alleged Joran caused them. However, the case was dismissed.

Joran tried to blackmail Natalee’s family into giving up her whereabouts

In 2010, he contacted the family’s investigator in the U.S. and got them to wire him $15,000 in an account in Aruba in exchange for details on where Natalee’s body was. He claimed he put it in the foundation of a house on the island but it turned out to be a lie, which he admitted in an e-mail. He used the money to flee to Peru on a poker tour.

In 2023, Joran pleaded guilty to extortion and wire fraud charges in the Birmingham, Alabama, court hearing. During this time, it was revealed that he faced charges for attempting to extort $250,000 from Beth, in exchange for Natalee’s remains. As a result of his plea deal, Joran had to confess the details of what happened to Natalee.

Joran was accused of murdering another woman 5 years after Natalee’s disappearance

The body of Stephany Tatiana Flores Ramírez, 21, was found in a room registered to Joran on May 30, 2010, bludgeoned to death. After lengthy legal wranglings, he was found guilty of  the “qualified murder” of Stephany in Jan. 2012 and sentenced to 28 years in prison. His current release date is June 10, 2038.

Joran has become a husband and father while behind prison bars

On July 4, 2014, he married girlfriend Leidy Figueroa in his prison cell in Peru. She reportedly gave birth to his child later that fall. His lawyer at the time told CNN he had no alternative motives other than love.

However, Joran and Leidy eventually split, as he asked her for a divorce by 2023. According to Daily Mail, he is now in a relationship with Eva Pacohuanaco.