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Joran van der Sloot Charged with Murder and Extortion

By Jason Beahm on June 09, 2010 | Last updated on March 21, 2019

Joran Van der Sloot, previously a murder suspect in the 2005 disappearance of Natalee Holloway and suspect in last Wednesday's murder of Stephany Flores Ramirez in Peru, was arrested Thursday in Chile. Van der Sloot, of Dutch nationality, is suspected of killing 21-year old Ramirez in Lima, Peru.

Ramirez was found dead in Van der Sloot's hotel room in Lima, the same day he entered Chile. Ramirez's body was found in Room 309 of the Hotel Tac according to police. She had been violently hit in the head, and her neck, torso and back, according to Peruvian police. Interpol has stated that Van der Sloot will now be extradited to Chile to face the accusations.

In what is being called a strange coincidence of timing, Van der Sloot also faces charges of extortion and a warrant for his arrest in Alabama, according to United States Attorney Joyce Vance. Van der Sloot allegedly attempted to extort $250,000 from an individual, promising to reveal the location of missing Alabama teenager Natalee Holloway and to detail the facts surrounding her death. The Alabama investigation was six weeks in the making, according to Vance. The arrest warrant goes through Interpol in an effort to lead to van der Sloot's prosecution in the United States, Vance said.

Extortion is the obtaining of property from another induced by wrongful use of actual or threatened force, violence, fear, or under color of official right.

Van der Sloot was arrested on suspicion of murder after Holloway's disappearance in Aruba in 2005. Despite admitting to being the last person to see her alive, Van der Sloot managed to avoid prosecution on grounds of lack of evidence. Van der Sloot stayed in the headlines over the years, twice allegedly confessing to the crime, which authorities refused to accept, finding Van der Sloot unreliable.


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