Posted on 06/04/2005 1:39:02 PM PDT by Graybeard58
ORANJESTAD, Aruba -- The mother of a missing Alabama teenager tearfully called for more help from U.S. authorities Friday in the search for her daughter, who disappeared on the last day of a high school graduation trip to this Caribbean island.
Police and volunteers combed beaches and scrubland for any sign of Natalee Holloway, putting up posters with a photo of the 18-year-old honor student. The wording on the posters was changed Friday to add a photo caption saying: "Kidnapped since 1:30 a.m. May 30."
Authorities say there is no evidence Holloway was abducted, but police commissioner Jan van der Straaten said "after four or five days you are afraid a crime has been committed." Aruba's coast guard also searched surrounding waters, an indication authorities are considering the possibility she might have been taken off the island with or without her consent. Police found her passport in her hotel room.
Holloway was on a five-day excursion with 124 seniors and several chaperones from Mountain Brook High School, near Birmingham, Ala. The students took a commercial flight, while the chaperones arrived on a private jet, said airport ground handler Albert Groeneveld.
The blonde teenager had just graduated and earned a full scholarship at the University of Alabama, where she planned to study premed, said her uncle Paul Reynolds, who came from Houston to help search.
Aruba police and the Dutch military were leading the effort with assistance from FBI agents.
Holloway's mother, Beth Holloway Twitty, urged the Dutch government Friday to request more help from the United States.
"We all have a common goal to find Natalee so we can bring her home," Holloway Twitty told a news conference, before choking up and leaving the room in tears.
However, Attorney General Caren Janssen said local authorities did not need more U.S. help. The State Department and the FBI did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment.
Holloway spent the last night of her holiday at Carlos 'N Charlie's bar and restaurant in the capital, eating and dancing with classmates and residents. She was last seen sometime between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. Monday, and didn't show up for her flight home hours later.
Police said they questioned and released three Aruban students who said they dropped Holloway off early Monday at the Holiday Inn where she had been staying just outside Oranjestad.
A Vietnam War veteran who was kidnapped two months ago in Trinidad is the only other American known to be missing in the southern Caribbean, the U.S. Embassy in Barbados said. In 2000, a travel writer from New Jersey disappeared while on assignment at a Jamaican resort. She was declared legally dead two years later.
Janssen said police have been receiving tips every hour, but "none has proven to be the golden tip." Hundreds of volunteers, soldiers and police scoured sand dunes, beaches and scrubland, checking each area searched on a map grid.
On an island known for its lack of violent crime, Holloway's disappearance shocked residents, and many said they were optimistic she would be found alive.
"She's not on the island," said Jany Winterdal, a 51-year-old taxi driver who has warned his two daughters, ages 23 and 28, never to accept drinks from strangers.
"In Aruba, we don't know what doing bad things to people is. For me, she's alive."
The search has not been extended to Venezuela, 25 miles from Aruba, or the neighboring island of Curacao, van der Straaten said.
Last year, there was one murder and six rapes on Aruba, an island of 72,000 people, compared to two murders and three rapes this year, police said. All the rapes were committed by local men on local women. The two murders involved drug addicts who died in knife fights.
About 13,000 tourists are on Aruba at this time of year, the Tourism Authority said. On average, 54,000 tourists pass through Aruba each month.
Some believe Holloway's disappearance could damage Aruba's idyllic image.
"I think something did happen. For somebody to go missing here, something happened," said Scott Brown, 34, of Pittsburgh, who has vacationed on the island for the past five years with his wife. "It's going to hurt Aruba."
Tourism Authority spokeswoman Gina Lopez acknowledged the possibility of a short-term decrease in tourism.
"(The disappearance) will tarnish the image a little while, but people will realize that it's only an unfortunate incident," she said.
They should really use some kind of a buddy system on trips like this.
Where were the chaperones when she took off with three strange guys?
She was in a nightclub so i doubt they were by her side...shes 18 so sooner or later you gotta let em be adult....she was too trusting and i just hope she is ok
MOM WAS RIGHT NEVER GET IN A CAR WITH STRANGERS!!
one little mistake...sad so sad...beautiful life maybe ended by one lil mistake....hang em high
These have to be the worst chaperones in history. They did not even copme on the same plane as the kids.
There were chaperones and they weren't doing their job OR she snuck out. It's so sad. I hope she hasn't lost her life for a mistake. Lots of people make mistakes everywhere in the world and live.
(http://www.omdurman.org/leaflets/whiteslv.html)
American women: you could be kidnapped and sold into white slavery in a country in which you have NO RIGHTS. As shown by at least three editorials in the Wall Street Journal-- one of the country's most strait-laced and reputable newspapers-- at least three female American citizens are being held in white slavery in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Royal Family is aware of this but has not done anything about it. The House of Saud apparently condones kidnapping and rape, as well as (per one of the editorials) forcible sodomy and incest. (One wonders which version of the Koran sanctions these practices?)
Wall Street Journal, 13 June 2002, page A18, "Daughters of America.""Saudi law forbids women of any age from leaving their country without permission. Another way of stating those same facts would be to say that two adult U.S. citizens are trapped in a country where women are treated as the property of men..."
"All the President's Women" (Wall Street Journal, 26 June 2002) http://opinionjournal.com/editorial/ feature.html?id=110001894
"...Miss Stowers further reported that both her son and daughter were raped by members of her former [Saudi Arabian] husband's family."If you are taken to Saudi Arabia, resisting the advances of a Saudi "husband" to whom you are sold may get you a flogging. Public floggings and executions of recalcitrant women are among the favorite pastimes of the male Saudi. Whereas no American judge or jury is likely to have a problem with your killing your rapist in the act, you could probably be beheaded or stoned to death for doing this to your Saudi "husband." Here is an example of how militant "Islamic" countries treat women in cases involving rape: http://dhushara.freehosting.net/book/ upd/jan01/iswomb/isl.htm "The girl, Bariya Ibrahim Magazu, was sentenced [to 100 lashes, in Nigeria] under Islamic law after three men forced her into having sex last September."
Hmmm...very interesting. My sister had to make a lot of copies of her passport before leaving for Japan.
Yes, Aruba is very small, but what I also find strange is that a woman, or anyone would get into a car with three strangers in the wee hours of the morning in a foreign land without telling someone?
I mean, come on, who the hell does that? People should exercise common sense and responsibility. You should never put yourself in dangerous situations.
With the advent of rohypnol (roofies), the innocent-seeming mistake was likely made well before getting into that car; she only need to look away from her drink for a little bit.
The sex slavery motive is a real possibility. The Aruba students could have been paid a fee for luring her away from safety. A young, blonde, American girl would command a high price on the black market.
My first thought is that someone dropped a 'date rape' drug in her drink, and that's why she left with the 3 men. I think they raped her, panicked and killed her. She was probably dumped off out to sea.
Missing-Girl Case Focuses on Three Men
(AP) By MICHAEL NORTON
ORANJESTAD, Aruba - Three men who said they dropped off an Alabama teenager at her hotel have emerged as "the most important lead" in the honor student's disappearance on this Dutch Caribbean island, police said Saturday.
An official close to the investigation said the three men _ legal Aruban residents between the ages of 18 and 25 _ told police they had taken Holloway to a beach at the northwestern tip of Aruba before dropping her off at the hotel.
But her uncle, Paul Reynolds, said he was told security cameras did not show Holloway returning to the hotel that night. Police declined to comment on that report.
Well, my mother taught me that if I leave my drink somewhere than leave it! Order another one! You never go back to it. You don't know if someone has tampered with it. It it very important to exercise caution and responsibility.
is*
"A Vietnam War veteran who was kidnapped two months ago in Trinidad is the only other American known to be missing in the southern Caribbean...."
I hope this young woman is found safe and sound. Regarding the coverage, however, I do wish the media would care about abductees who aren't young women. Seems to me they're hoping for a new serial ala Chandra Levy, Laci Peterson, and others.
A Vietnam vet was kidnapped two months ago and he rates a passing mention in this story? Something's not quite right--even at Fox.
I'm always mystified by magicians and card sharks. It's quite possible that the drink never left her hand while she was distracted.
Maybe if she'd used the buddy system, but then again, maybe the search would have two targets.
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