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Natalee Hollaway's mother expects answers

8/27/2005, 2:50 p.m. CT
By MARGARET WEVER 
The Associated Press

ORANJESTAD, Aruba (AP) — Natalee Hollaway's mother said Saturday she believes "we are going to get answers" in the nearly three-month-old disappearance of the vacationing U.S. teenager after the arrests of two brothers who were previously detained and released in the case.

Satish and Deepak Kalpoe were arrested Friday on suspicion of involvement in premeditated murder and rape of the 18-year-old honors student, Aruba's prosecutor's office said. The Surinamese brothers were arrested after new evidence emerged, the office said, without elaborating.

"I was pumped up at the news," Beth Holloway Twitty told The Associated Press by telephone from her home in Birmingham, Alabama. "The strongest thing I felt was that we are going to get answers."

Holloway Twitty said she didn't know what evidence authorities had on the brothers but said their re-arrests seemed to support the family's suspicions.

Holloway Twitty said she didn't know what evidence authorities had on the Kalpoes but called their arrests a vindication for the teen's family, which was angered by a judge's decision in July to release the brothers for lack of evidence linking them to the teen's May 30 disappearance.

"We've worked so hard for three months to figure out what happened to Natalee," Holloway Twitty said. "I thought those (Kalpoe) boys never should have been released. When they were ... I was devastated."

Holloway Twitty said she was at home this weekend to visit her 16-year-old son and would return to Aruba next week.

The prosecutor's office also said the Kalpoes were suspected of other offenses, but they did not provide details. No details were disclosed about a third man who authorities said was arrested Friday with the Kalpoes.

Holloway Twitty said she wasn't surprised by the arrest of the third man, who she identified only as "Freddy," saying police and FBI agents had repeatedly mentioned him to her as a "person of interest" in the case.

Holloway Twitty said the suspect was a friend of 18-year-old Joran van der Sloot, who has been detained since June 9 in the disappearance of Holloway. She said the man lived near the van der Sloots' home in Noord and had previously been questioned as a witness.

A judge ruled Friday that prosecutors had enough evidence to hold the three men for at least eight days while they build their case, said Elgin Zeppenveldt, a lawyer for Satish Kalpoe.

"We are appealing the decision, because the prosecution is withholding documents from us," Zeppenveldt said.

The July release of Satish, 18, and Deepak, 21, was one of a series turns in the case that have included discoveries of possible physical evidence or witnesses that later turned out to be false leads.

Holloway, of Mountain Brook, Alabama, was last seen leaving a bar with the Kalpoe brothers and van der Sloot on the final night of a high school graduation trip to the Dutch Caribbean island. Extensive searches of the island have produced no sign of the teen.