Portrait of a Monster: Joran Van Der Sloot, a Murder in Peru, and the Natalee Holloway Mystery (5 page)

In recent months, friends said he had pushed a classmate through a glass display case while waiting to see a movie at the local cinema. Joran later minimized the event, saying the other person had accidentally fallen into the case. Both sets of parents intervened to help their sons reach an acceptable resolution.

While these incidents might have landed most juveniles in jail, or at least in trouble with the police, Joran had a way of explaining his way into and out of any and all situations. His impassive brown eyes could be so utterly sincere that it was almost impossible to believe he was not telling the truth. This skill of “believability” would serve him well when on the prowl for the young female tourists who frequented the island.

Joran and his friends had nicknames for each other. His was “Jojo.” When cruising the town, they jokingly referred to each other as “pimp” and their circle of male friends as the “Pimpology Crew.” They had a system for picking up girls, their targets often being American tourists like the teens from Alabama who had just joined Joran at the blackjack table. He thought American girls were the “loosest of the lot,” followed by the local girls, and then the Dutch girls. The Americans, he thought, tended to overindulge in alcohol, probably because the drinking age in the States was twenty-one. On Aruba, the legal age was eighteen, and even then it was not carefully enforced.

Located in the southern Caribbean Sea, below the hurricane belt and seventeen miles north of Venezuela, Aruba was a rum-soaked oasis of powder-fine sand beaches, calm turquoise waters, and raucous bars and beachside tiki huts. Its sultry temperatures were cooled by signature trade winds that permanently bent the island’s divi-divi trees toward the sea. It was a place to lose oneself, if only for a long weekend.

The perfect weather, the rhythm of steel drum bands, the cool, crisp Balashi beer, and the whir of blenders mixing daiquiris and piña coladas fueled a party atmosphere that began early in the morning and continued well into the night. For American tourists, Aruba was a place of escape, a tropical retreat where they could forget about work and school, cast their inhibitions aside, and for the length of their vacation lead lives of unrestrained debauchery.

But despite its motto “One Happy Island,” there was another side to Aruba that most tourists never saw. Like on any other Caribbean islands, crime and drug trafficking were serious problems. Because of its close proximity to Venezuela, drug traffickers used Aruba as a way station to move heroin, cocaine, ecstasy, and other narcotics from South America to the U.S. and Europe, sometimes recruiting cruise ship employees as couriers.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency kept a close eye on Aruba. But nobody was keeping an eye on the teenage population of Aruba. Many of Joran’s friends were locals whose parents worked in the service industry. The long and often late hours of hotel and restaurant jobs left them little time to devote to parental supervision and their children tended to run wild. While Joran’s parents were professionals and preferred the company of their insular circle of Dutch ex-pats, Joran wanted nothing to do with the stuffy transplants from his native Holland. He had moved to Aruba with his family when he was four and considered himself an island boy.

Joran’s parents were inclined to keep their eldest son on a tight leash, but the call of the island nightlife was just too strong. Despite juggling at least two girlfriends, Joran had an insatiable sexual appetite and was often out on the prowl. He’d lost his virginity at fourteen, and devoted much of his free time to trawling downtown bars such as Carlos’n Charlie’s, Choose-A-Name, Tantra, and Club Báhia, hoping to hook up with tourist girls. That he was tall and physically developed made him appear older than he actually was.

Joran was also becoming a familiar face at the casinos along the Palm Beach strip. The beachfront resort area was on the leeward side of the island and boasted full-service, brand-name hotels, including the Marriott, the Wyndham, the Hyatt Regency, and the Holiday Inn. Of the dozen gaming establishments on Aruba, all but one were located on Palm Beach.

The Excelsior Casino inside the Holiday Inn was Joran’s favorite. It was shabby compared to the other casinos on the strip but still saw plenty of action. Despite having the character of an Elk’s Club lounge with its black metal chairs upholstered in fake blue leather and drab gunnel-green carpeting with bright orange swirls, it was a favorite among the island’s locals. In fact, Caribbean stud poker was born there in 1988.

Its location on the second floor of the Holiday Inn made it convenient for tourists, especially guests of the oceanfront resort, but American gamblers sometimes found playing in the Excelsior a frustrating experience. English was the official language at the tables, but after a hand was played, many players reverted to Papiamento, their native language.

Papiamento is a patois of Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, English, French, a smattering of African languages, and Arawak, the language spoken by the indigenous population before European conquest. It was the preferred language of the locals, and was widely spoken on the neighboring islands of Bonaire and Curaçao.

To the untrained ear, Papiamento sounds much like Spanish, and many of the Islanders who spoke the language could also speak Dutch, Spanish, and English. American gamblers didn’t understand the Creole, and believed the Papiamento-speaking players, in concert with the dealers, used the language to dupe them.

Joran’s native language was Dutch, but he was fluent in Papiamento. He had been a regular at the Excelsior for more than a year. He’d been honing his skills at regular Sunday and Monday night poker games, developing a deep understanding of the game. He was good with math, and had an uncanny ability to size up the vulnerabilities of those around him.

At seventeen, he was a juvenile who was technically not allowed in the casinos. But his father held a prominent government post on Aruba and no one raised any objections when he brought his son to the tables.

His parents might not have recognized that poker was fast becoming an obsession for Joran. The shuffling of the cards, the clank of the chips, the luxurious feel of the felt on the table in front of him, Joran loved it all. He felt like an adult, an important person, when he was gambling. The complimentary cocktails didn’t hurt either. Joran usually ignored the plastic cups of cold Balashi beer, a locally brewed pilsner, preferring whiskey or rum.

This particular Sunday, he was in a losing streak. He’d been in the Excelsior since four o’clock, participating in a Texas hold ’em tournament with his father, Paulus. Joran, although several inches taller, bore a striking resemblance to his father. The elder Van der Sloot was tall and handsome, and at fifty-three had a receding hairline and metal-framed glasses, but there was no mistaking that the two were father and son.

While Paulus’s game was baccarat, Joran was developing a passion for poker and had actually taught his father and several of his own friends how to play. The Texas hold ’em tournament at the Excelsior was a “free” tournament, meaning there was no entry fee and each player was given $500 worth of play money, like Monopoly money. The players were dealt seven cards and used their five best cards to form combinations. Gamblers were eliminated from the competition when the play money ran out. Real cash prizes were awarded to the winners.

Joran and his father had begun playing in the tournament at 4:00
P.M.
But after two hours, Joran was forced to fold and gave up his seat to walk around and watch others play. He knew that so much could be learned by simply observing.

During a break in the action, Paulus located Joran and told him he was going home. His wife, Anita, was in Holland for her grandmother’s ninetieth birthday celebration, and he was in charge of their three sons. Joran’s ten-year-old brother Sebastian was at a friend’s house and due to be dropped off shortly, and fourteen-year-old Valentjin was either already home or on his way. Paulus needed to feed the boys and get them to bed early because it was a school night. Joran also had school in the morning. Because it was final exam week, his schedule was light and varied from day to day.

Not wanting to spoil his son’s fun, Paulus told him he could stay longer and take his seat at the poker table. While his wife would never have allowed this, Paulus was proud of Joran. He had been accepted to six schools, including Saint Leo University, in Saint Leo, Florida, a Catholic school about thirty-five miles north of Tampa. The college was his son’s first choice, and he had been awarded a full scholarship.

Joran’s mother had taken him to the States to visit several of the schools that had accepted him. Anita was pleased that Joran had chosen Saint Leo’s. A small Catholic college would provide a structure similar to the one she tried to create in the Van der Sloot household. The psychologist Anita had forced Joran to visit at least once every three weeks agreed. Although she had only seen him five times, she also liked the structure and supervision that Saint Leo’s could most certainly provide.

This night, however, had Anita been home, she would never have permitted her son to stay out sipping cocktails and gambling when he should have been at home studying. She was the disciplinarian in the household and a strict one at that.

Joran loved his mother, but he found her smothering and at times overbearing. At seventeen, he wanted her to give him a little more space. But she had been unwilling to give him much freedom, especially in light of recent incidents.

What Anita didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her, Paulus reasoned.

“Call me when you’re ready to come home,” he told his son in Dutch upon leaving the casino that night. “I’ll come pick you up.”

After only thirty minutes at the poker table, Joran again ran out of play money and went to find a cocktail waitress. After four hours in the casino, he wasn’t quite ready to call it a night and once again checked out the action from the sidelines before taking a seat at a nearby blackjack table. He was there only five minutes when the Alabama teens settled in next to him.

The four teens looked like cheerleaders, two blondes, two brunettes, all young and pretty. Joran could tell by their blue plastic wristbands that they were staying at the Holiday Inn SunSpree Resort and were guests with the all-inclusive package.

Located near the end of a strip of high-rise hotels on J. E. Irausquin Boulevard, the boxy, yellow six-story structure wasn’t the nicest hotel on the island. Not by a long shot. But it was directly on the beach and surrounded by palm trees with fun island-themed décor. The all-inclusive plan, with no additional fee for meals and soft drinks, was particularly attractive to groups and budget-minded travelers. The blue plastic bracelets issued at check-in identified these guests, who were then entitled to unlimited food and sodas at the resort’s four restaurants and three bars.

The young ladies explained that they were on holiday with 124 members of their senior class to celebrate their graduation from Mountain Brook High School, located in suburban Birmingham. The four, Natalee Holloway, Ruth McVay, Lee Broughton, and Katherine “Madison” Whatley, were all good friends and had elected to share a room. They had been assigned a ground-floor room with two double beds, a patio, and a partial view of the ocean.

Seven chaperones had accompanied the group, but supervision had been loose. Many of the students were already eighteen, the legal drinking age in Aruba, so the chaperones had been permissive when it came to their alcohol consumption. Basically, as long as everybody checked in once a day, the adults didn’t ask any questions.

Many of the teens were really enjoying their five days of tropical freedom. They had been drinking booze literally by the “yard,” bar slang for the tall yard glasses typically used in British pubs for drinking ale. A true yard glass, fluted at the top with a round bulb at the bottom, held two and a half pints of beer. Some of the students were also gambling in a casino for the first time, including Natalee Holloway and her three roommates.

Natalee’s roommate, Ruth McVay, had been more curious about gambling than Natalee and the other girls. Over the course of several nights, Ruth had lost some money at the blackjack tables and wanted to win it back.

Sliding into an empty seat next to Joran, Ruth quickly fell deeper into the hole as her friends watched over her shoulders. Down nearly U.S.$30, she turned to the young man in the blue-and-white-striped polo shirt, his brown hair close cropped like a young Marine’s, and half-jokingly asked if he could help her win her money back.

Van der Sloot chuckled but agreed to assist. “I’ll do what I can,” he said. “My name is Joran.” He was more than happy to gamble with someone else’s money. Besides, the girls were cute.

Ruth and the three other teens introduced themselves. Though the same age as her friends, Ruth looked like the youngest of the bunch. She had a sweet Southern voice and shoulder-length brown hair with long bangs, and wore a turquoise tank top that showed off her light, even tan.

Standing behind Ruth, her three friends watched as Van der Sloot schooled their friend in blackjack 101, telling her when to hit and when to pass. He looked like a nice guy, tall, good looking, athletic, and fluent in English. He wasn’t aggressive or flirtatious like so many of the men the girls had met on the island who just wanted to get them into bed. He was focused on his hand, and looked serious about the game. He seemed like a normal teenager, one of them.

But it was all an act, one he had nearly perfected. Joran had spent much of the past year in the casinos learning how to deceive his opponents at the gaming tables. It was a simple system. When dealt a bad hand, he knew it was important to disguise his emotions, so he would visualize a winning hand and his facial expressions would fall in accordingly. To be believed, he had to convince himself that the lie was the truth. The strategy also doubled as a foolproof way to pick up tourist girls.

Joran and his Aruban friends were aware that young women on vacation seemed to have a certain distrust of the locals, so it was best to pretend to be a fellow traveler, one of them. That way they wouldn’t suspect he was a beach bum looking for a one-night stand.