Rep. Jordan to Newsmax: Expect to Get FBI Docs From Natalee Holloway Case

Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, chair of the House Judiciary Committee, told Newsmax on Wednesday he sent a letter to FBI Director Kash Patel requesting documents regarding a 2010 sting operation in which the suspected killer of Natalee Holloway was able to evade law enforcement despite allegedly being in around-the-clock surveillance.

"I think we’re going to get the information," Jordan, who was unsuccessful in getting the FBI to reply to a similar request during the Biden administration, told "The Record with "Greta Van Susteren." "First of all, when you go through that, you're struck by, they're running a sting operation, and they lose track of the bad guy, and you want to know how did that happen or more importantly, why didn't you just arrest the guy once the crime of extortion was obviously done and completed?

"So, we've sent a letter to the FBI. I will tell you this: It's been night and day [between] Director Patel and his FBI and [predecessor] Christopher Wray, [Attorney General] Pam Bondi and Merrick Garland. We sent subpoenas to Kash three-and-a-half weeks ago on a number of other issues. They've been complying, giving us the information. Let's hope we can get the same response here."

In 2005, Holloway accompanied her classmates on a high school graduation trip to Aruba and was last seen May 30, 2005, leaving a nightclub with Joran van der Sloot. Five years later, van der Sloot attempted to extort money from Holloway’s mother Beth Holloway in exchange for detailing the location of Holloway’s remains and manner of her death.

The FBI organized a sting operation in Aruba to surveil the money transfer and apprehend van der Sloot. After the transfer of a portion of the money that van der Sloot demanded, the FBI assured Holloway’s attorney that van der Sloot was under 24-hour surveillance. But van der Sloot left the country and checked into a hotel on May 14, 2010, in Peru while he allegedly was under FBI surveillance. On May 30, 2010, van der Sloot murdered 21-year-old Stephany Flores in a Peru hotel room, a crime for which he pleaded guilty to and sentenced to 28 years in prison.

Van der Sloot was extradited to the U.S. in 2023 to face charges for extortion and wire fraud in Alabama, and he later confessed to killing Natalee Holloway. In a plea deal, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison on the extortion and wire fraud charges, which will run concurrently with his charges in Peru. He was not charged in connection to Holloway's murder.

In his letter, Jordan gave the FBI an April 9 deadline to provide documents related to the sting operation and to the FBI’s surveillance of van der Sloot.

"I expect that," Jordan said. "They’ve been tremendous in helping us get answers to the questions that Americans have."