| Advertisement |
June 8 (UPI) -- A plane carrying Joran van der Sloot landed at an airport in Alabama Thursday, the first step on the way to his facing extortion charges in connection with the 2005 disappearance case of Natalee Holloway. The 35-year-old was in the custody of FBI agents, who flew to Peru to extradite van der Sloot.
Advertisement
Agents arrived in Peru Wednesday afternoon and boarded a plane with van der Sloot early Thursday morning, after picking him up from the prison where he has been serving a sentence for murder.
Van der Sloot, the leading suspect in the mysterious disappearance of Holloway, 18, was serving a prison term in connection with the murder of another woman.
The Dutch national was picked up by authorities from the Ancon1 prison in Lima, from where he traveled to the Air Force Base Grupo, where he was met by FBI agents.
A federal indictment accuses him of a plot to sell Beth Holloway, Natalee Holloway's mother, information on her daughter's whereabouts for cash. Holloway's body has never been found.
During a recorded 2010 conversation, Beth Holloway's attorney, John Q. Kelly, met with van der Sloot at an Aruba hotel, giving him $10,000 in cash as Beth Holloway wired $15,000 to van der Sloot's bank account, according to prosecutors.
Kelly met van der Sloot Aruba after money was exchanged, telling him Holloway was buried in the foundation of a home with the help of his father, who has since died. He said Holloway died when she hit her head on a rock after picking her up and throwing her to the ground, prosecutors said. Kelly said the information was "worthless."
He was originally charged with extortion in 2010.
Holloway met van der Sloot and others in Aruba on a senior graduation trip. Authorities believe van der Sloot was the last person to see Holloway alive. An Alabama judge declared her officially dead in 2012.
