Joran van der Sloot has admitted to killing Natalee Halloway when she was on spring break in 2005, a federal judge revealed. The Alabama teen’s disappearance sparked a manhunt and national outrage.
A U.S. federal judge said Wednesday van der Sloot confessed as part of a deal where he pleaded guilty to extortion and wire fraud in connection with the Alabama teen’s remains.
“I have considered your confession to the brutal murder of Natalee Holloway,” Judge Anna Manasco said after reading van der Sloot’s plea.
The judge revealed that Holloway wasn't the only young woman van der Sloot killed. Van Der Sloot, 36, a Dutch citizen, has not been charged in Holloway’s death but was sentenced Wednesday to 20 years in prison after asking her family for $250,000 to reveal the location of her body.
The new sentence is to run concurrently with a 28-year sentence he is serving in Peru in the 2010 slaying of Stephany Flores.
"You have brutally murdered in separate incidents years apart two beautiful women who refused your sexual advances,” the judge said, referring to a separate killing in Peru in 2010.
Holloway’s mother lambasted van der Sloot in court after his plea.
“For 19 years you denied killing Natalee Holloway. Your lies have caused indiscernible pain. You have finally admitted that you murdered her,” Beth Holloway said in court.
“You are a killer and I want you to remember that.”
Van der Sloot apologized to Holloway's family in court, media reports said.
Her body has never been found, although in 2012 an Alabama judge signed an order declaring her legally dead.
She was last seen exiting a bar in Aruba with van der Sloot in May 2005.