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Updated June 10, 2005, 2:45 p.m. ET

Lawyer: Missing Alabama teen went to beach with men before she disappeared

ORANJESTAD, Aruba (AP) — A missing Alabama honors student went to an Aruban beach with a Dutch teen the night she disappeared and had sexual contact with him in the car, a defense lawyer representing one of five men arrested in the case said Friday.

Natalee Holloway, 18, drove with the Dutch teen and two Surinamese brothers to Arashi beach, on the northern part of the island, Noraina Pietersz, a court-appointed lawyer representing one of two former security guards arrested in the case, told The Associated Press. Pietersz read from testimony given to police by the two brothers last week.

Five people -- the Dutch student, two Surinamese brothers and two former security guards -- have been arrested in the disappearance of Holloway, who was last seen in the early hours of May 30. She was in Aruba celebrating her graduation from high school in Mountain Brook, Ala.

Holloway disappeared hours before she was to take a flight home. Police found her passport and packed bags in her hotel room.


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Authorities have not said Holloway was a victim of foul play and have not ruled out any possibilities, including that she may have drowned.

"We think she's alive," said Holloway's stepmother, Robin Holloway, who added that authorities told the family they had expanded the search to other nearby islands.

After Holloway and the three men went to the beach, they drove her back to her hotel, where she stumbled and was approached by a man wearing a security guard uniform, another defense attorney, David Kock, told the AP.

His comments came after Holloway's stepfather, George "Jug" Twitty, told the AP she met the Dutch student in the casino of her hotel and flirted with him two days before she disappeared.

Aruba Prime Minister Nelson Oduber said finding Holloway was the "No. 1 goal" on the Dutch Caribbean island, where volunteers, police, coast guard officers and Dutch soldiers continued their search Friday.

Twitty told the AP he met with the Dutch teen and Surinamese brothers early Tuesday, and they told him they were with his stepdaughter at Carlos'N Charlie's nightclub restaurant Sunday night, shortly before she disappeared.

The men said Holloway had been dancing and flirting with the Dutch teen, the son of a high-ranking Dutch judicial official in Aruba, before they dropped her at the hotel, Twitty said.

She was drunk and stumbled when she tried to get out of the car, the boys told him. When the Dutch teen tried to help her she refused, saying, "I can stand on my own," the men told Twitty.

He said the meeting was arranged by the police.

Kock said his client, Satish Kalpoe, 18, and his brother, Deepak, 21, told police they saw a black security guard approach Holloway in the parking lot in front of the hotel lobby before they drove off.

"That's why they (two former security guards) were detained," Kock told the AP.

Oduber said his government was working closely with U.S. authorities, who have sent FBI agents and divers to help in the search. Holloway's disappearance had left Arubans "in a state of shock and disbelief," he said.

"The hearts of the people of Aruba are touched by Natalee and her family," he said.

Oduber met with Holloway's relatives and pledged that police would not exclude anyone from their investigation.

In Mountain Brook, classmates who went to Aruba with Holloway said the Dutch teen was at several places the group visited, including the restaurant-bar where she was last seen.

Marcia Twitty, Holloway's aunt, said the Alabama students recognized the Dutch detainee from photos shown them by FBI agents.

"They had seen him around during the trip. He was just a local guy in the bar and the casino where all the kids were just kind of hanging out," she said.

Attorney General Caren Janssen said the three were arrested Thursday but she refused to identify them or say on what grounds they were being held. Authorities previously described them as students, and had questioned and released them last week, describing them then as witnesses and "persons of interest."

Police also impounded a gray Honda. Holloway's friends reported last seeing her leave Carlos'N Charlie's in a silver car.

The Dutch detainee, an honors student at Aruba International School, left his home in the middle-class Montana neighborhood of Oranjestad on Thursday with his head covered in a blue-and-green towel.

Under the Dutch judicial system, which Aruba follows as a protectorate of the Netherlands, people can be arrested on suspicion of a crime and held for up to 116 days without being formally charged.

Officials were investigating whether the three detainees had any connection to two former hotel security guards held in the case since Sunday, Janssen said.

The two ex-guards, Nick John, 30, and Abraham Jones, 28, will remain jailed at least until a court hearing next week, Janssen said. They have not been charged.

Pietersz said she spoke to her client in jail Thursday and decided not to demand his immediate release. "We prefer to let the prosecution investigate, confident that my client will be released" by Wednesday, she said.

Five FBI agents remain in Aruba observing the investigation, said Judy Orihuela, FBI spokeswoman in Miami. Two FBI divers traveled to Aruba over the weekend and returned to the United States early this week.

"They were asked to do some site survey," Orihuela said. "They never got in the water."

The Aruba government and local tourism organizations have offered a $20,000 reward for information leading to Holloway's rescue, her family and benefactors in Alabama have offered an additional $30,000 and Carlos'N Charlie's donated $5,000.

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