Where is Natalee Holloway? Part three: the plan

From the second part of our series, it became clear that Joran Van der Sloot blamed Natalee Holloway for getting into the car and riding along with him and the brothers Deepak and Satish. But what exactly was so wrong about her choice? Every day girls accept rides with men, and that doesn’t necessarily end tragically.

Let’s return to what Joran himself writes in his book:

Deepak asks her: “If your friends say you should go with them, maybe it’s better if you do. Are you sure you want to come with us?”

Natalee: “Yes, I want to come with you.”

“Are you sure you want to come with us?” is far from an innocent question. It carries implications, risks, and danger. Compare it with: “Are you sure you want to bet €100,000 on red?” Or: “Are you sure you want to cross the ocean alone in your self-built sailboat?”

Deepak doesn’t seem to ask the question lightly and even phrases it as advice to Natalee: “If your friends say you should go with them to your hotel, maybe that’s better.” With those words, he almost pushes Natalee out of the car. But Natalee insists and says she wants to stay with Joran and the brothers. A strange choice, and we don’t know why she made it. Maybe she was infatuated with Joran, maybe she was drunk, maybe she had taken drugs, or maybe she simply assumed that Joran and the brothers would drop her at the Holiday Inn.

Everyone, except Natalee, seems to realize what is about to happen when the Honda Civic pulls away from the bus stop. Natalee is sitting next to Joran in the back seat. He is seventeen, she eighteen, they have already kissed, and it is her last night on Aruba before flying back to Alabama the next morning. Of course Joran wanted to have sex with Natalee. He regularly had sex with American tourists on the island. This boy-meets-girl moment was not so world-shocking after all.

In the interview with Greta Van Susteren for Fox News, Joran even admits this:

VAN SUSTEREN: “That was your intention (to have sex) and you were hopeful that was her intention?”
VAN DER SLOOT: “Yes.”

Joran writes in his book (p. 85): “She comes very much on to me and I think what every seventeen-year-old boy would think in such a moment: sex. She is tipsy, but she knows very well what she is doing.” I believe Joran here. His words are direct, without indicators of deception. Natalee was tipsy, high-spirited, and likely did not see the danger sitting next to her in the back seat.

“The Plan”

In an interview with Fox journalist Greta Van Susteren, which I also used for the podcast with Ruud Tuithof, Joran lets something slip that makes us wiser:

“Then we ended up leaving. The plan was to go to my house.”

What stands out is his use of “the plan”. This reflects a certain purposefulness and method. Something premeditated. Something of which the outcome was still uncertain. That is why it is called “a plan”.

Compare: “The plan was to get Messi’s autograph.” Here too, it is a plan, with a goal and uncertainty about the outcome. You never know if the plan will succeed.

“The plan was to go to my house” is also a textbook example of the passive form. This form is often used to conceal identity and responsibility. In “the plan was to go to my house” we don’t know whose plan it was. Who conceived the plan? Who was responsible? Joran keeps that hidden through the passive.

He could easily have said: “Natalee and I wanted to go to my house together to have sex there.” In that sentence it is crystal clear who the actors are and what they want. But Joran doesn’t say that. He speaks of the plan. And what it was. Passive, therefore.

All these elements give the impression that this was Joran’s plan, possibly in concert with Deepak and Satish. In his book Joran writes: “Deepak asks: ‘Kiko nos ta hasi?’ – ‘What are we going to do?’ in Papiamento.”

What is striking is that Joran does not provide an answer to Deepak’s question in his book. And here too, important questions arise. Why does Deepak speak to Joran in Papiamento? That is a language Natalee does not understand. At the very least, it is extremely rude towards her. Is she not supposed to hear what is being cooked up between Joran and the brothers? Was that the reason for the language switch? Is Deepak asking with “What are we going to do?” what Joran intends with Natalee? Does he want to know where he should drive, since Deepak was the driver?

Vintage Joran Van der Sloot

Joran continues in his book: “Deepak drives, Satish is in the front, Natalee is behind Satish and I am behind Deepak. She wants to know if I have a big house. I say that we have quite a big house here. I ask her where we are going. She answers: ‘I want to come with you to your house.’”

Again, Joran places the initiative and responsibility with Natalee. Not only did she want to dance with him and get into the car with him; she (according to him) decides where they are going — to his house. At least, if we are to believe Joran.

Do we?

No.

Joran’s language, especially the words “the plan was”, reveals a completely different reality. The plan — Joran’s plan, whether or not with the brothers’ knowledge — was, more than likely, to take Natalee Holloway home and have sex with her there.

But what happens on the way to his house? Did Natalee also want sex? Did she allow herself to be meekly led to the house of Joran Van der Sloot?

You’ll read about it soon in part four.