[Fedupwithit]

The reason they have chaperons is to PREVENT foolish decisions like this. I have NO SYMPATHY for the chaperons.

After talking to my wife, sister, and some girl friends, they are all of the opinion that her BEST FRIENDS should be raked over the coals for this disappearance too, and I agree with them. What kind of friend(s) lets you go off on some strange island with three guys she just met by herself? I mean, if Natalee was drinking, a "friend" is someone who keeps an eye out for you, and says "that might not be a good idea for you to leave with them".

...and on the drinking thing, I was married in Aruba last October, and we had a crew of people go to Carlos n Charlies one night, and EVERYONE in the place is drinking. Natalees mother is living in a dream world if she didn't think her daughter wasn't drinking that night.

[PBRSTREETGANG]

...they are all of the opinion that her BEST FRIENDS should be raked over the coals for this disappearance too, and I agree with them.

From the start I've thought that she may not have had a lot of close friends, or at least none on this trip. All of the comments I've seen thus far seem to have come from acquaintances. Good friends would've been looking out for her and wouldn't have let her go off on her own like this. It seemed odd from the beginning that nobody noticed that she was missing until she failed to show up for the plane.

[mware]

The best advice I heard regarding this was from a criminal investigator who basically said, "Never ditch a friend, ESPECIALLY when they are under the influence of alcohol.

[A Ruckus of Dogs]

What kind of friend(s) lets you go off on some strange island with three guys she just met by herself?

The friends mught have been just as drunk.

[HungarianGypsy]

I mean, if Natalee was drinking, a "friend" is someone who keeps an eye out for you, and says "that might not be a good idea for you to leave with them". Even though it's not the exact scenario (I was younger and it was at the local mall, not across the world) a good girl friend will still look out for others. I was about to go to the house of a guy I had been around a few times. Even though it made the boy she was out with that night a bit annoyed, this wild girl I knew not only made it clear I was not going anywhere with this guy(she even had her date run him off), but also sat with me until I was able to get a ride home. That's what real friends do.