- PATRICK: JORAN’S ‘BEST FRIEND’ -

When Joran returns to the Netherlands in 2006 he is overwhelmed by so-called friends and the press, who question him constantly about the disappearance of Natalee Holloway. Patrick at least is someone who doesn’t ask or so it seems. It becomes obvious that Joran likes to smoke large amounts of weed. This is why Patrick decides to pose as an experienced weed cultivator which makes Joran look up to him even more.

But Patrick is interested and suspects that Joran is involved with the disappearance of Natalee Holloway. He gets this from the innuendos the 20 year old makes. Patrick doesn’t respond to these, but does approach our show with this story. Together with Peter R. de Vries they develop a strategy to get Joran talking about the case in front of the camera.

From the start it is clear that Patrick is indeed Jorans best friend. There are numerous complimentary text messages and a couple of phone calls, made in our company, to confirm that. Our plan is to use a car prepared with hidden cameras to create a relaxed environment for Joran to talk. In the second half of November everything is ready to go. Patrick will pick up Joran in a tricked out Range Rover to go and cruise around and of course to talk.

- ARREST RUINS PLAN –

But then, a day before we would start, the ministry of Justice ruins our plans. On the 21st of November 2007 Joran is arrested and brought back to Aruba. There are a couple of new facts in the judicial investigation, but Joran keeps his mouth shut and on the 7th of December he is a free man again and officially not a suspect anymore. Out of everyone, our insider Patrick is one of the first people he calls from Aruba. Patrick tapes the conversation.

Joran boasts that he was too clever for the police and that soon he will be back in the Netherlands. On the 9th of January he arrives at Schiphol airport and one day later he meets up with Patrick to see his new Range Rover, the car that has been prepared with three hidden cameras.

- THE WINE INCIDENT -

On the 10th of January 2008 we start our undercover operation. An advantage of the recent arrest is that Patrick can now bring up the subject naturally. During their first drive it becomes apparent that joran has a low opinion of the public prosecutor and the department of justice.  He declares that he wants to claim damages from everyone and is invited to speak on the Pauw & Witteman show. As luck would have it Peter R. de Vries will also be there. After the show Joran throws a glass of red wine in Peters face.

Two day’s after the famous wine-incident Joran gets into Patricks Range Rover again. Our cameras capture Joran talking for the first time in detail about Natalee Holloway. He confirms she’s dead and will never be found because ‘the ocean is big’. He also declares that he can never be caught because he was lucky.

Furthermore he relates that he was helped in the disposal of the body. Who this is or who these people are (Joran talks often in the plural), he won’t tell yet. What follows are four long drives in which our hidden cameras tape 15 hours of conversation.

- COMPLETE CONFESSION -

At last Joran gives a complete confession, in which he reconstructs in detail what happened on the fatal night of the 29th onto the 30th of May 2005 on Aruba.

He and Natalee were dropped off that night by the Surinam brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe in their silver-gray Honda Civic nearby the Mariott Hotel on Palm Beach.  This is more than 100 meters away from the so-called Fisherman’s Huts, of which Joran talked about to the police.

After that he and Natalee were making love on the beach, when all of the sudden Natalee started to shake and seemed to have died. Joran dragged her body to some bushes that grow alongside the beach and walked up to a payphone near the swimming pool of the Marriot Hotel to call a friend.

- THE FRIEND WITH THE BOAT -

Joran phones a person named ‘Daury’ who is half Dutch and half Aruban. A couple of other times Joran talks about the fact that he was helped by several other people that night.  Daury has a boat docked in front of the hotel in which he takes cruise tourists on ‘tubes’ and ‘bananas’.  Daury came instantly to Joran and together they quickly declared that Natalee was in fact dead.
Together they carried the girl from the beach into Daury’s boat. Daury tells Joran to walk home. He, the friend, takes off onto the ocean where he throws Natalee’s body out of the boat into the sea. After that he visits Joran at his home, he has an apartment in the garden of his parent’s house, to talk about what happened. Joran tells Daury he walked back home and  hid his shoes in a storm drain. Later on he sat some time behind his computer and the following morning he went to school as usual. The next night he went to the casino ‘just to be recorded on camera’.  In a cold premeditated manner he leaves behind traces which could clarify that he didn’t have time to kill Natalee. Very clever for a seventeen-year-old, but Joran is of course the son of a judge-to-be.

- HEARTLESS -

Joran shows no emotion towards Patrick when he tells him that he didn’t sleep one night less because of the whole situation. He also tells him that Natalee’s death was in fact quite fortunate for him. “Now I can abuse the whole situation”, he says indicating the book he has written.

Jorans friends Deepak and Satish, who have been arrested for this case several times, are completely innocent. Joran declares with pride that he has abused them to create an alibi for himself. He calls them “very stupid boys’”.