Suspect in Natalee Holloway Disappearance to Appear in Court

THE HAGUE, Netherlands – A student suspected in the 2005 disappearance of American teenager Natalee Holloway on Aruba was appearing in a Dutch court Thursday in a hearing to clear the way for his transfer to the Caribbean island, a prosecution spokesman said.

Joran van der Sloot, 20, was arrested Wednesday in the central Dutch city of Arnhem on suspicion of involvement in voluntary manslaughter and causing serious bodily harm that resulted in the death of Holloway. Two other suspects, Surinamese brothers Satish and Deepak Kalpoe, were arrested in Aruba.

Wim de Bruin, a spokesman for the Dutch National Prosecutor's Office would not say when Van der Sloot would be flown to Aruba.

"First he has to appear before an investigating judge in Arnhem," he said. In line with Dutch law, the hearing will not be open to the public.

Hetty Kester, a press officer at Arnhem District Court, 100 kilometers (60 miles) southeast of Amsterdam, said that at the hearing, scheduled for 4:30 p.m. (1530 GMT), a judge would confirm Van der Sloot's identity and that he had been arrested properly.

He is expected to be flown to Aruba on Friday.

Holloway, of Mountain Brook, Alabama, was last seen leaving a bar with the three men on May 30, 2005, hours before she was scheduled to board a plane home with high school classmates celebrating their graduation. She was 18 at the time.

Hundreds of volunteers, Aruban soldiers, police and FBI agents searched for the missing teen. Efforts included divers, Dutch F-16 jets equipped with search equipment, and specially trained dogs. No trace of her was ever found.

"It's just renewed some hopes that the police are going to find answers to this disappearance of our daughter," Dave Holloway told Associated Press Television News on Wednesday.

Van der Sloot and the Kalpoe brothers had been detained previously in connection with Holloway's death, but they denied involvement and a judge released them for lack of evidence.