Alabama public defender seeks to represent Joran van der Sloot in extortion case

FILE – Joran van der Sloot sits in the courtroom before his sentencing at San Pedro prison in Lima, Peru, Jan. 13, 2012. The government of Peru on Wednesday, May 10, 2023, issued an executive order allowing the temporary extradition to the United States of Joran van der Sloot, the prime suspect in the unsolved 2005 disappearance of American Natalee Holloway in the Dutch Caribbean island of Aruba. (AP Photo/Karel Navarro, File)

by: Drew Taylor

Posted: May 15, 2023 / 04:53 PM CDT

Updated: May 15, 2023 / 04:53 PM CDT

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (WIAT) — The man being tried for allegedly defrauding the family of an 18-year-old girl who went missing in Aruba 18 years ago may be getting a public defender in Alabama.

Kevin Butler, a federal public defender for Alabama’s Northern District, has filed a motion asking for a public defender to be appointed to the case against Joran van der Sloot. van der Sloot is charged with extorting the family of Natalee Holloway out of $25,000 to tell them where her body was buried in Aruba. According to an indictment, van der Sloot allegedly lied about the location he told them about.

The Dutch man has been a suspect in Holloway’s disappearance ever since the Mountain Brook native disappeared during a senior trip to Aruba in 2005. Although he was arrested and questioned in Holloway’s disappearance, van der Sloot was never charged with any crime in the case. To this day, Holloway has never been found.

Butler claims van der sloot, who has been in custody in Peru since 2010 for the murder of Stephany Flores, has no money for a lawyer.

van der Sloot is in the process of being extradited from Peru to Birmingham to stand trial on federal extortion and wire fraud charges.