Natalee Holloway justice? Joran Van der Sloot gets 28 years

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- The parents of Natalee Holloway, the American teenager who disappeared in Aruba in 2005, say their ordeal hasn't ended with a judge declaring their daughter dead. They hope a young Dutchman seen leaving a bar with Holloway on the last day she was seen alive might ultimately be brought before a U.S. court.
Joran van der Sloot, 24, pleaded guilty Wednesday in Peru to the 2010 slaying of a young woman he had met in a Lima casino. That plea from the Dutchman, described as the prime suspect in the Holloway case, came hours before Thursday's hearing in Birmingham where Dave and Beth Holloway watched a judge rule their daughter legally dead.


"We've been dealing with her death for the last six and a half years," Dave Holloway said after Thursday's hearing. He said the judge's order closes one chapter in the ordeal, but added: "We've still got a long way to go to get justice."
Thursday's hearing was scheduled before van der Sloot -- who had been questioned in Holloway's disappearance -- pleaded guilty to killing a 21-year-old Peruvian, Stephany Flores.
She was slain five years to the day after Holloway, an 18-year-old from the wealthy Birmingham suburb of Mountain Brook, disappeared.
Dave Holloway said he hopes van der Sloot, who awaits sentencing, gets a 30-year prison term sought by Peruvian prosecutors. Shortly after Flores' death on May 30, 2010, van der Sloot told police he had killed the woman in Peru in a fit of rage after she discovered on his laptop his connection to Holloway's disappearance. Police forensic experts disputed the claim.


Flores' murder took place May 30, 2010. That's precisely five years to the day that Holloway was seen leaving a nightclub in Aruba with Van der Sloot and two other men on May 30, 2005.


After that night, Holloway vanished.


Her disappearance made international headlines and triggered a massive, multiagency search that included sifting the bottom of the ocean floor off Aruba in a bid for clues.


Over the years, Van der Sloot has told law enforcement officials, as well as the media, conflicting stories about Holloway. In one scenario, he politely dropped Holloway off at her hotel. In another, he left her, alone, on the beach after she collapsed. He also claimed at one point that he sold her into sexual slavery. And, of course, he has said that he had nothing at all to do with Holloway's disappearance.


While U.S. authorities did not have the jurisdiction to charge him in Holloway's disappearance, they have not given up hope that he will someday be forced to face charges in a U.S. courtroom.


In another turn of events, Van der Sloot allegedly contacted Holloway's mother, Beth, and promised to reveal everything about his daughter's disappearance -- in exchange for $250,000.


The FBI, which became involved in the alleged 2010 extortion plot, set up a sting to capture Van der Sloot. But he fled to Peru with a down payment of several thousand dollars that was wired to him as part of the negotiations.


In a sad coincidence, Holloway's family was in court this week for a previously scheduled hearing. The matter? A formal declaration of her death, necessary so that her parents can tend to matters related to the teen's meager estate.