Dave Holloway Seemingly losing his Patience with the Natalee Holloway Investigation

Dave Holloway goes “On The Record” with Greta Van Susteren November 4, 2005. It appears that even Dave Holloway has his patience limit. Appears that Dave Holloway may have been pushed over the line by the Aruban prosecutors and investigators.

Greta: Tonight Natalee Holloway’s parents and step parents are furious with the way her case is being handled in Aruba. They are demanding big, big changes. Natalee’s father Dave joins us live from Meridian MS.

Greta: Dave, the letter sent to the Aruba Attorney General dated Nov 1st asking for the removal of the prosecutor and lead detectives…have you heard a response to that letter.

Dave: We did receive a response late this afternoon. That response was directed to Alabama Governor Bob Riley. He faxed it on to me and the basic content of it was this.
We are still waiting on the Attorney General to respond. The Dept. of Foreign Affairs which is the government of Aruba basically indicated that the lead investigator, the police department and the prosecution team is supervised out of Holland in The Hague and that they have no authority to intervene in the investigation.

Greta: So basically pass the buck and try to dodge the bullet.

Dave: Exactly.

Greta: Let me talk a little bit about the letter. One of the things that made me almost fall out of my chair when I read the letter is that around June 1st when you arrived after being notified that your daughter was missing is that you went around the island including the police station talking to a detective Dennis Jacobs. When you went in there to see him he made a remark asking you when you’re looking for your daughter if you have any money. Tell me the facts surrounding this discussion.

Dave: Well, when we first arrived on the island we rented a car. We stopped at two different police stations and explained the situation. I explained that I am the father of Natalee Holloway and she is missing. The first comment was would you like to file a complaint? Finally after talking to several officers in those two police departments, they indicated they were not aware of any disappearance and not aware of any complaint. So the directed me to the Noord police station which supervises the area around the Holiday Inn. When I arrived at that police station, the detective knew I was coming and I was frantic as you can imagine a parent being who has their daughter missing. I walked up to the front desk accompanied by my brother and brother in law.
I identified myself as the father of Natalee Holloway and Jacobs got up from his chair and grumbled “Well, how much money you got?” We were just stunned and everyone finally came together and we met in the back room He basically told us “Aw, this happens all the time, go down to C&C and have a beer and just wait on her and she’ll show up.” We questioned his tactics and wanted to know if a search was being conducted. He just looked at us and said “Why would you want to do that?” “Think positive, you’re thinking negative.” I said well the first few days are the most critical.
He indicated to us you are on the wrong page and you need to go search a drug house or whatever. And then he made the comment that “Look, I need to get with you guys. There have been some reports that some of Jugs friends have been busting up in some of these crack houses.” I was again floored. I thought how do you know about crack houses and who’s up in them, but you are not even aware someone is missing? You know, give me a break.

Greta: Dave, did you get the sense that his remark about money was a very bad joke or that he wanted money from you to pursue the investigation?

Dave: I don’t know, sometimes I wonder now what the real motive is. I met with them again this past week and again one of the references was how money do you have and how long can you continue searching for your daughter. He said “Most of these cases we would have quit investigating long ago.” That’s when I decided we need a change.

Greta: Natalee Holloway’s father recently asked the deputy chief to do him a favor and he was turned down. Dave, what was the favor you asked of Deputy Chief Dompig?

Dave: We felt that we had a real key witness that I felt if he was interviewed properly that it could break this case. I went to the chief and expressed my concerns with the investigative team for one. I mentioned this witness as well. We had been watching the witness and knew he was very nervous. We felt like the time to strike is now while the iron is hot. I spoke with him that day, and the next day I called him early that morning.
I asked him “Gerold do me a favor. I’ve hung with you this long and can you please, please handle this interrogation?” I think if you handle it right, we could possibly solve this case. As of today, that has yet to be done.

Greta: I should add that you don’t want to disclose the witness name because you don’t want to impede the investigation. Dave, did Karen Jannsen the last time you were in Aruba, which was about 2 weeks ago…did she meet with you?

Dave: I met with her the first day, yes.

Greta: Did she seem to you to be on the ball and aggressively pursuing this case? What is your gut reaction to her?

Dave: Well, the conversation did not last very long. She was still waiting on the tapes from the FBI. She indicated those tapes would be received the following week. In fact, they came within a couple of days.

Greta: Do you know why she doesn’t meet with Natalee’s mother?

Dave: I have no reason to believe why she shouldn’t.

Greta: In terms of the access, do you have a feeling or does it seem to you that in the last couple weeks that your access to information or communication with them has been cut short?

Dave: I had very good communications with them up until Thursday. When I left the island, it seemed like the light switch went off. I left a couple of friends down there with Texas Equusearch and they were needing assistance. They indicated that once I left the island, no phone calls would be returned and they didn’t get any assistance. Tim became very upset, as you have heard on another show. He was ready to go ahead with Beth’s comments about boycotting Aruba. When that was mentioned, he received a phone call all apologetic and that sort of thing. So, I don’t know. It seems like when the press gets on them, they want to work with everyone. Then when the press gets off of them things go back to the usual.

Greta: What’s your theory in terms of this investigation? Is it they don’t care, they are covering up, they don’t want to, they’re inept, it’s legally impossible? What’s your theory?

Dave: There are lots of things going on down there. You have the police department; you have mistrust among several of the departments. We saw that first hand with evidence handling. In fact, a bone was found just recently and rather than giving it to the detective team, the beach police or whoever went above them and gave it to someone else. Evidence was getting lost or mishandled all along. When I went down there back in Sept. one of my goals was to try to develop some communication between the investigative team and the prosecutor’s office. We started providing tips through emails so everyone would know what was going on. I even found the theories. You look at an investigative team and the theories are she is alive and well all the way to this is a homicide case. When you have an investigative team that has that much different disparity between the theories, something’s going on. I figured out then that they didn’t have much of a case.