Reports Conflict in Case of Missing Ala. Teen

ORANJESTAD, Aruba – Reports conflicted Saturday in developments of the Alabama honor student who has been missing in Aruba for almost two weeks.

David Cruz, a spokesman for the Aruban Minister of Justice (search) told FOX News Natalee Holloway (search), who was on vacation with friends with a graduation trip when she disappeared, was confirmed dead and that authorities knew the location of her body.

However, Cruz later retracted the statement, saying he was a victim of a "misinformation campaign."

The mother of the 18-year-old told FOX News authorities had not yet contacted them with this information but did say that Natalee's father, who is divorced from her mother, was with investigators looking for the body.

These reports came after significant, and at times conflicting, developments with the five suspects being detained in the case.

The "Diario," a local daily newspaper, is reporting that a human blood sample found in a car at the residence of one of the teens in custody — the 17-year-old son of a high-ranking island judicuary official — is now being sent to the U.S. and will be tested for a possible match to Natalee, whose mother gave a blood sample to investigators.

One of the young men detained admitted "something bad happened" to the woman after they took her to the beach, a police officer said, while prosecutors said the investigation was at a crucial point.

But prosecutors refused to comment on the statement by Deputy Police Commissioner Gerold Dompig (search), who told The Associated Press that the man who made that admission was leading police to the scene. He refused to identify which of the three young men who took Holloway to a northern beach the night she went missing made the statement.

Police refused Saturday morning to say whether they discovered anything overnight to solve the mystery of what happened to Holloway, who was last seen in the early hours of May 30.

Referring to Dompig's statement, prosecution spokeswoman Vivian van der Biezen (search) said Saturday: "We neither confirm nor deny any information coming from other sources ... [about] alleged statements of suspects in this case."

"The investigation at the moment is the following: Five suspects are being held ... and we are at a very crucial, very important moment in our investigation," she said.

A judge ruled Saturday that police can continue to detain three young men — two Surinamese brothers and the Dutch teen — arrested in the disappearance of Holloway.

Police also have detained two other men — former security guards at a hotel near the one where Holloway was staying. No one has been charged in the case.

Holloway vanished during a five-day trip to the Dutch Caribbean island with 124 classmates and seven chaperones celebrating their graduation from Mountain Brook, Ala., High School, near Birmingham. Police found her U.S. passport and packed bags in her hotel room after she failed to show up for her return flight that day.

Prime Minister Nelson Oduber said on national radio Friday night that if something happened to Holloway, it would damage the reputation of this island of 97,000 people, which depends on tourism and is considered one of the safest spots in the Caribbean.

In Holloway's hometown, her friends gathered after midnight at a church where people have been holding prayer vigils for her. Some hugged and cried; one woman left a flickering candle at the base of a wall decorated with messages to Holloway, who had earned a full scholarship to the University of Alabama, where she planned to study medicine.

Antonio Carlo, an attorney for the Dutch minor, told the AP: "My client maintains his innocence."

Holloway's mother and stepfather told The Birmingham News in Alabama that they discovered the Dutch boy's connection to their daughter within 24 hours of her disappearance by talking to other students on the trip. They then found surveillance videotapes showing him playing poker with other Mountain Brook teens in their hotel casino two days before she vanished.

A lawyer for one of the Surinamese — Satish Kalpoe, 18, whose brother, Deepak, 21, also is in custody — said they told police they took Holloway to Arashi Beach, on the northern part of the island, in the early hours of May 30.

According to their police statement, they did not get out of the car, Carlo said. Instead, Holloway and the Dutch teen, an honors student at the Aruba International School whom she had met at the casino in her hotel, "were in the back seat kissing."

They also told police that they dropped Holloway at her Holiday Inn at about 2 a.m. and last saw her being approached by a man in a security guard uniform before they drove off, Kock said.

The brothers told police the blonde, blue-eyed young woman was drunk and refused to get out of the car, said Noraina Pietersz, who is representing Mickey John, 30, one of the two former security guards. He and Abraham Jones, 28, have been detained since Sunday.

The three young men said Holloway stumbled in the parking lot of the hotel but refused help from her Dutch escort, Kock said.

Holiday Inn employees say security cameras did not record Holloway's return. A Holiday Inn guard who worked the overnight shift that day said he did not see her, said Pietersz, who said she reviewed the guard's statement to police.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.