Where is Joran van der Sloot from originally?

A murder trial nearly 20 years in the making came to a head in mid-October of 2023, following a long-overdue confession from Joran van der Sloot.

Van der Sloot confessed, in a proffer letter on Oct. 18, to the 2005 murder of Natalee Holloway. The case surrounding her death targeted Van der Sloot on several occasions over the years, but a lack of evidence — and Van der Sloot’s wily nature — kept him out of jail for decades. In that time, he reportedly engaged in human and drug trafficking, killed another woman — this time in 2010 — and did everything in his power to dodge charges, but the law eventually caught up to him. His arraignment is long overdue, but it seems the Holloway family may finally be headed toward some kind of closure. Van der Sloot was already serving a lengthy sentence in Peru for the murder of his second victim, Stephany Flores. He was extradited to the U.S. early — initially, he was supposed to remain in a Peruvian prison until 2038 — and now faces charges from that two-decade old murder.

With Van der Sloot’s confession, scrutiny of that 2005 case is once again spiking. People are rushing to learn more about the man behind so many atrocious acts, as they await a hopeful conviction that will land him behind bars, permanently.

Joran van der Sloot’s home country

Many of the crimes Van der Sloot is accused of occurred outside of the U.S., but the charges he currently faces — for wire fraud and extortion — were against Holloway’s American mother. The man’s cross-country crime spree leaves many confused as to his country of origin, due to the fact that he’s served prison time in Peru and now faces more in the U.S.

That’s despite the fact that Van der Sloot originally hails from Arnhem, a city in eastern Netherlands. He committed the first of his murders within the bounds of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, in Aruba, according to his recent confession, before fleeing its boarders and spending years flitting from country to country to avoid capture. His second murder occurred in Peru, half a world away from his first.