FBI agents left Peru Thursday morning to bring Joran van der Sloot to Alabama to face federal charges of extorting money from the family of missing teen Natalee Holloway.
Van der Sloot, a Dutch national, is the prime suspect in Holloway’s disappearance and presumed death in 2005 during a high school senior trip to Aruba, but he has not been charged. Instead, he was indicted on wire fraud charges in 2010 for taking $25,000 to provide information about Holloway’s death, including the location of her body, and demanding $225,000 more, as CrimeOnline previously reported.
He provided no useful information. Earlier this year, the Peruvian government agreed to extradite van der Sloot to the United States to face the extortion charges. He is currently serving decades in a Peruvian prison for the murder of 21-year-old Stephany Flores in 2010 and drug smuggling while he was already in prison.
His attorney, Maximo Altez, tried unsuccessfully to block the extradition, and he left Lima on a plane just before 8 a.m., the attorney told Fox News. Van der Sloot is expected to arrive in Birmingham, Alabama, Thursday afternoon.
Holloway’s body has not been found, although she was declared dead in 2012.
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[Featured image: Joran van der Sloot prepares to leave Peru Thursday morning/Col. Carlos López Aeda via Fox News]
