By REBECCA MOWLING
A desperate last phone call from missing Natalee Holloway could provide police with a vital link to the killers in the Aruba murder case. The National Enquirer has discovered what may have been a last cry for help by the 18-year-old honors student.
Shortly after she was last seen alive, she left a message on a close friend’s cell phone. Chillingly, a sinister male voice is heard in the background asking Natalee: “Are you calling home?”
An insider in the investigation said: “Her friend believes it could have been the last call from Natalee, who was in trouble and desperate for help.”
In a stunning development on July 4, two of the three suspects in the case — brothers Deepak Kalpoe, 21, and Katish Kalpoe, 18 — were released from custody. The prime suspect, Joran van der Sloot, 17, was ordered to be detained for 60 more days for continued interrogation.
Natalee, from Birmingham, Ala., went missing after enjoying the final evening of a five-day graduation trip to the Caribbean island. Her classmates last saw her at 1 am on May 30 when she left Carlos ‘n’ Charlie’s bar, a popular nightspot in the town of Oranjestad, with a tall, dark-haired teenager later identified as Van der Sloot.
Sources close to the investigation say Natalee appeared to be traveling inside a car when she phoned her pal at a time police will give only as “between 2 am and 5 am”.
The friend, who had been in Aruba with Natalee, had her cell phone turned off as she flew home to Alabama and didn’t listen to her messages until later that day. It is believed her final chilling words are on that voicemail.
Authorities are combing through phone records to locate where the call came from. They appear to have been stung into action by the efforts of Natalee’s mother, Beth Holloway Twitty, 44, who flew to Aruba that day and immediately began her own investigation.
Charles Croes, who owns a rental phone business in Aruba, revealed that he had been contacted on May 30 by Natalee’s family trying to trace a phone call.
“A close friend of mine called me up who was working with Natalee’s family to help find her,” he said. “My friend explained there was a call made by Natalee and he was hoping that the phone call was made from one of our phones.” After becoming involved in the case, the businessman helped Natalee’s mother identify and track down Van der Sloot, the son of a justice official in Aruba.
When Croes confronted Joran, the 6 ft 5 ins schoolboy tennis star claimed Natalee had been doing drugs and drinking before he took her home. “He (Joran) told me that she was coming onto him, and dancing provocatively, and then she said she wanted him to have him take her home. He then agreed to that,” Croes said.
As we reported exclusively two weeks ago, Aruban police believe that somebody slipped Natalee the drug Ecstasy while she was inside the bar.
They suspect she died of a drug overdose after going off with Van Der Sloot and the Kalpoe brothers. The three gave conflicting accounts of how they left Natalee to find her way home. Joran later changed his story to claim that he and Natalee were dropped off at a beach near the Marriott Hotel, where he left her alone at 1:50 am.
But investigators became convinced he and Natalee were never even on the beach. “It’s hard to believe any man would leave a girl alone on a beach in the early hours of the morning,” said the source.
“Joran has told so many lies there’s no reason to believe his latest story is true. There are no independent witnesses who saw them on the beach and no trace was found of Natalee during a search of the area.
“Perhaps Joran has been deliberately trying to throw the investigation off by lying about where they were.”
Whatever the truth of how Natalee died, our investigation reveals that her body may not have been disposed of that night. It is extremely difficult to hide a body, especially with only a couple of hours before daylight,” said another source.
“Natalee weighed about 110lbs. If she was dumped at sea it would take 165lbs — one and a half times her body weight — to prevent the body from resurfacing.
“And a boat could not have been used to transport the body in the middle of the night without raising suspicion.”
Authorities believe it is unlikely that one person was able to move the body and they have continued to question Joran’s friends as possible suspects involved in Natalee’s disappearance.
Dutch-born Joran’s father, Paulus van der Sloot, a former acting head of the government legal department, was arrested and held for three days in connection with the investigation.
“We have information that Joran’s father Paulus called several of Joran’s friends in the following days and asked them to back up his son’s alibi,” revealed the insider. Officials believe Paulus met with the three suspects a couple of days after Natalee vanished and told them: “Without a body, the police don’t have a case against you.”
