One of the last pictures of Natalee Holloway and the three other ‘central figures’ Satish and Deepak Kalpoe and Joran van der Sloot taken in Aruba.
Amigoe.com
12/18/2007
ORANJESTAD – The Public Prosecutor (OM) decided not to prosecute the three suspects in the Holloway-case. The dossier does not have enough evidence for a violent crime or culpable homicide. Also the burden of proof for possible legal evidence is not sufficient, concluded the OM.
The OM informed the suspects Joran van der Sloot (20) and the brothers Deepak (24) and Satish Kalpoe (21) this morning that they are no longer being prosecuted. Also the American lawyer of the parents of Natalee Holloway was informed. The fact that the body of the missing teenager was never found is for the OM ‘an important shortage’ in the possible reconstruction of what had exactly happened. “Because of that, the current dossier cannot give sufficient answer on the question which punishable facts took place in the night of Holloway’s disappearance, nor can it answer the question what the exact role of the suspects was in this”, said the OM.
That the suspects continued to be silent during the recent interrogations was also a disappointment for the OM, because they have assumed that the suspects would start talking this time. The OM emphasizes though that if they find new important evidence, the prosecution will start again till the offences become barred, which is 6 years for culpable homicide and 12 years for manslaughter.
The bailiff of the OM informed Lawyer Ariean de Bie of this between 11:00 and 12:00 this morning. “That definitely concludes the case", said De Bie. “All's well that ends well. There was just not enough evidence.”
Yet, it could have just turned the other way. “The OM was constantly talking about less serious facts, for which they could have been prosecuted. But that didn’t happen. They never had any evidence, just indications. And could their indications have legalized this exercise? I wonder why they kept saying: we have evidence, we have evidence.”
