Episode 563: A Deeper Look at the Crimes of Joran van der Sloot With Christopher Cassel
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This is a special Morbid. Shut up. I was going to say that. I was really going to say this is a special edition of Morbid because we've got a guest today. We have director Christopher Cassell on. He's going to be talking to us about his new documentary on Peacock. It's called Pathological, The Lies of Joran Vandersloot. It is...

Such a great documentary. Like, if you like true crime documentaries, you're going to enjoy this. Yeah, it's wild. It gives you some very interesting points of views.

And we just covered the Natalie Holloway case on Morbid. I believe it's the last episode. It should be the last episode that we did. So after listening to that, this is kind of a perfect little companion because you get to hear a little more behind the scenes. Yeah. Going deeper. Our guy Chris there, he talked to a lot of like the major players in this case. He talked to people outside of it.

It's interesting. He has a unique point of view on the whole thing. He does, definitely. Yeah, and he was really, really open with giving us a ton of information and stuff. It was a really fun conversation. Yeah, it was definitely a lot of fun. So here you go. Enjoy.

All right. So hello, Chris. How are you? I'm doing really well. Thanks for having me. Of course. Thank you for coming on. We're talking about Pathological, The Lies of Joran van der Sloot today. It premiered on Peacock and it was a really entertaining documentary. It was awesome. Thank you. And I think one of the first questions I wanted to ask you is I actually noticed that this is one of the first true crime documentaries that you've done. Is that right?

Um, it's, I would say the third. So yeah, I did, um, two series for ID that I directed. Um, nothing super recent. One was in 2019 called Primal Instinct. And then the other was way back in 2011 called Red Brom. Okay. Nice.

So what drew you into the Natalie Holloway case specifically? And what would you say the main goal of making this specific documentary was? Well, I remember, you know, as does everybody, you know, who's, I guess, any older than 20, everybody remembers this Natalie Holloway case. Yeah.

And, you know, it was always sort of fascinating and tragic. And, you know, I sort of just kept tabs on it over the years. The timing of this seemed, you know, it seemed appropriate because this is really...

Most likely the end of the line for the story of Yorin. I don't think there'll be another chapter, at least related to Natalie, you never know. But it seemed like the right time to look back and do a pretty exhaustive and comprehensive look at all sides of the case.

but not only the Natalie case, but the case in Peru with Stephanie Flores. And then the strange and disturbing connection between the two, which really leads into that extortion trial that he faced in the States last year. Right. Which, you know, just kind of connects the two cases in this weird and surprising way. So, yeah, I mean, it just felt like the right time. It's a fascinating character. Well, if you can call him a character, Joran, you know, it's just...

Such a, I guess, a textbook psychopath, really. 100%. Yeah. Yeah. But just somebody who...

It's just fascinating that somebody can be that cold, you know, and I kind of wanted to try to get beneath the surface of that as much as I could. I feel like the documentary did a good job of pointing out the fact that when he definitely is a psychopath and all the reasons why he is and the characteristics behind that. And it gave a lot more too, because we were talking about this because we just covered the case on the show, the Natalie Holloway case at least. And we were talking about how when it was going on in real time, it was

it became such like a convoluted kind of coverage of the case that it was, you weren't really getting coverage of the case anymore. You were getting like these wilds, like back and forths and these weird interviews that he was doing. And like, I remember watching it being like, but what's happening? Like what's going on? There were so many interviews. And it's like, nobody knew what was going on. We just knew like the kind of like sensationalistic way that it was being shown. And I feel like the documentary really like

honed in on what we all wanted to know what was going on and who he is and why, like how all this happened. Yeah. And I never realized until I did the film how many different versions of the Natalie story he told. I think in the end we counted about 12. It's wild.

I was trying to count them as I was going through. Yeah. It's unhinged. And it almost seems like it was part of a strategy. And I don't know if it was initially a conscious strategy on his part or not, but just to further muddy the waters by just telling all these different stories. And with this confidence that he had that the body wouldn't be found, you know, and so...

Exactly. He figured, you know, there's nothing that really going to do to him without the body. So he's just going to, he almost seemed like he was having fun with it all. Yeah. It seemed like he was trying to prove something. Like he was kind of trying to prove, like, I can change this story a hundred times and nothing's going to happen to me. Yeah. And you're all just going to have to listen to it. I'm going to send people on wild goose chases and I can do it because I'm Yoran.

And it really did. No one's going to find it. The scary part is how long it worked for him doing that. Yeah. Yeah. It's crazy. And, you know, you can just see almost this sort of like devilish glee that he takes as he's in these interviews and sort of telling all these different, you know, tall tales. Absolutely. And then as we go into, you know, he figures out how to profit off of them and that sort of becomes the way he makes his living. Exactly. So gross. So just, yeah, it's just sick. The way he smirks through them really like turns your stomach. Oh, it does. Yeah.

But like we just touched on, I mean, the details of the Natalie Holloway case are so well known, especially given the way that it captivated the nation and the way it was like parlayed in the media. But in your documentary, I thought it was a really great balance of information with Natalie's story and with Stephanie's story, which I do feel like sometimes gets lost in retelling of these cases. Did you know from the start going into this that you wanted to tell the story side by side, kind of going through the timeline with both girls like you did? Yeah.

I don't know at the very beginning if I knew that, but I figured it out pretty quickly when I looked at the symmetry of the dates and they were five years apart, like to the day, which is just wild. To the day. And a lot of those like, you know, so there's the day they both disappeared. And then the several days after that in both years, 2005 and 2010, that had these striking parallels, right?

And it just seemed like that would be a good way to interweave them and then to see the similarities, you know, in his kind of actions and just in these scenarios that happened so, so far apart. So the other thing is, you know, I didn't want to only tell the Natalie story up front and go chronologically because I feel like the Peru story is the one that people are less familiar with. And I wanted to inject pieces of that early on so that, you know, we could

Right. Yeah. I mean, that was the other really cool kind of...

coup for us, really. I mean, her story is crazy. She's, she's like officially on the run from the law. She was really hard to find. She's like, you know, by design, she doesn't want to be found. And she's somebody nobody had ever heard from. This was the first interview she'd ever done. And so we wanted to showcase that right up front and, you know, let people know that

You're going to learn something new here. Even if you followed every single piece of the case for 18 years, you know, you're going to find out some new things. Definitely. And I think Eva's a good representation of how he just victimizes women, like, constantly. And one of the things that I learned watching the documentary was that he actually has quite a history of being violent or predatory with women. And you did touch on that in the documentary. Can you kind of expand on that a little bit? Sure, yeah. I mean, there's...

We can kind of only go by the reports of people who, well, two of our best sources were the authors of a book called Portrait of a Monster, who did a lot of research, spent a lot of time in Aruba talking to people off the record, on the record. You know, Yorin's inner circle there, his family is very tough to crack. So it took some detective work to put together the pieces of his childhood. But what we were able to find was that, you know, he had this violent streak and this sort of angry streak from a pretty early age. And

By the time Natalie came along, he was 17, but he had this whole MO down. He already had a lot of experience getting into the casinos because he looked older. He had figured out how to kind of woo these tourists that would come in. And so many teenage American tourists were coming down, particularly back then. It's changed, actually, since Natalie. So he had a whole...

Like just a whole kind of approach that, you know, he'd used on girls before Natalie and also on local girls. So there were several that had filed complaints against him prior to Natalie's disappearance that hadn't quite been investigated yet.

And then in the shadow of all this media that erupted on the island after Natalie disappeared, they all kind of shrunk away and just decided they didn't want to talk. And so it seems that there was already a well-established pattern of sexual abuse and violence in his history, even before the point that, you know, Natalie disappeared.

It is crazy how all that kind of got overshadowed or covered up. And I think part of that has to do with, like you said, their family history is very hard to uncover. And kind of going into that, I think...

The relationship with van der Straaten, the lead investigator, he had close ties with Jorn's dad. Can you tell us a little bit more about that and what that kind of looks like? Sure. They were both from the Netherlands. Aruba is a province or a, you know, it's under the Netherlands control or umbrella. And so there are a lot of Dutch who come over and work in the government, work, you know, in kind of the legal trade in Aruba.

And both van der straaten and Paulus van der Sloot were among those. They had come over, they had been friends in the Netherlands. They came over, I think when Joran was four or Paulus did, I don't know when van der straaten got there, but they apparently were so close that van der straaten was Joran's godfather. So clearly they're, um, you know, kind of an inside connection between the family and law enforcement and quite likely, you know, uh,

if not a spoken effort, an unspoken effort between the two men to, you know, try to sweep this under the rug. Definitely. And do you think, because obviously, and we see it in your film, when Paulus dies, that's when Joran really starts to kind of spiral out of control. Do you feel like that was a pivotal shift in how everything played out in the rest of this case, these two cases? Yeah, I think it definitely was. So, I mean, not to say that Joran went from a, you know, saint to a sinner at this point. He was already...

He was already kind of well-established as being kind of a bad guy, but after his father dies,

It's interesting, we talk about at the funeral in the Netherlands, Joran throws himself on the casket. He makes a big show of saying, this is all my fault, thinking that the stress of the case, which is quite probably right, that the stress of the case is what caused Paulus's heart attack. And so whether Joran really deeply feels this remorse and this personal responsibility or not is impossible to say. But certainly he made a big show of it.

And so he then goes back to Aruba to, you know, ostensibly take care of his mother, help his mother through this hard time. But no sooner is he back there than he starts emailing Beth Holloway's lawyer. Beth is Natalie's mother.

And with this proposal to basically try to profit off of his knowledge of where Natalie is and profit off of Beth's vulnerability and her desire for answers. And so that's such a dark, I mean, even for somebody like him to then decide not only to end someone's life and not admit it, but then go back to the mother of that person and shake her down for money in exchange for answers is just kind of a new level of diabolical.

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And so this starts to happen right after his father's death. And then within two weeks of

you know, him kind of striking this deal, which we can go into deeper detail if you like about. He flies off to Peru and, you know, and then goes on to murder another girl. So, yeah, it seems like, you know, you could definitely point to this, to the death of his father as being a really significant turning point for him. 100%. And I felt so bad for Beth's lawyer. One of the parts in the documentary is that he feels like he has blood on his hands because of this whole extortion thing that happened

It did somewhat fund his trip to Peru, but how was he to know that that was going to happen, you know? Yeah. And, you know, he really expected that once the FBI, because the FBI was involved in this and so was the Aruban police or investigators. And he didn't think...

He thought by the time he left the island, he being John Kelly, Beth's lawyer, that Yorin would have been arrested and picked up for basically fabricating this whole story that he told John when he was there, which they captured on audio tape and videotape. And so he had no expectation that Yorin was going to have time to spend this money. He thought, you know, he was right. It was like a one way ticket to jail. And then, you know.

And that would be it. But they didn't pick him up. And we're not, and we talk about this, like, we don't know why. We don't know why the FBI didn't pick him up at that point or the Reuben authorities, and he was able to skip town. There's so many points in the story where you're like, how is he continuing to get away with these things? And especially with the FBI's involvement, it's really mind-boggling that he was able to continue just to go on and do what he did. And it was like that watching it unfold, too, in real time. Because I remember there were so many times during this case where we were all like,

This is it. This has got to be it. They're going to find Natalie. They're finally going to arrest this guy. Everyone knew. We were all just waiting for it. And I just remember all the time thinking like,

Why are they arresting? Like, what is going on? Like, why is this taking so long? It's wild. It is wild. But the weird thing is, too, they did arrest him in Aruba and they held him for, I think, 90 days and they interrogated him and they flew in these special Dutch investigators to run these brutal interrogations and he just never gave them anything. So that led some people to think, well, maybe he is innocent because he hasn't fessed up and he's only 17. Like, how could he not?

crack under pressure. He's a hard 17. Yeah, he was. No kidding. But, you know, if you have, you know, as we talk about in the film, some of these characteristics of psychopathy, you know, a lack of remorse or,

real feeling of any kind, it's probably a lot easier to kind of resist some of those typical interrogation tactics. For sure. Definitely. He really is, like you said, a tough 17 and like a character. Yeah. Going into making this film, I did read that you did try to reach out to get some kind of comment from him, right? Yes. I sent him a, through his public defender in Alabama, I sent a letter.

And I never got a response. But I think they were pretty much they had a pretty strict embargo on him talking to anybody while he was in the States. Definitely. How do you think that would have changed the film? Do you think it would have changed the film in any way?

It certainly would have. Yeah, I mean, I would have been compelled to kind of make his point of view, you know, a primary part of the story. And I'm almost, you know, you always kind of want to hear from the protagonist, but, you know, in a way, I'm almost glad that we didn't get him. I think I am glad because, you

He would just spin so many lies that, you know, we wouldn't get any closer to the truth. We'd probably be further from it. And I think it was actually better that we were able to

look at him from different points of view, from, you know, more objective, you know, and kind of more sane points of view and not be clouded by the, all the lies that he would tell. And, you know, his, he's also as psychopaths usually are very good at elicit, eliciting sympathy and empathy. And, you know, he certainly would have tried that with us, I'm sure. And,

And may have left more of the audience feeling sympathetic for him than I think he would deserve.

So, oh, I think that would be awful. I completely agree. I agree. I wondered how you felt about that, but I definitely agree with you that I think it makes it better that he wasn't, he didn't have a voice necessarily. He's had enough of a voice. You know, we do include a lot of interview clips with him over the years, but really in the context of showing that, you know, this was all a game for him and, you know, that it was a game of profit. It was just, you know,

And just one lie after another. And you can kind of see that pretty clearly when you intercut all these different interviews he did. Definitely. Over the years. Was there anything that you learned along the way that came as a shock to you or anything you didn't know previously about the case and making the film that you learned? Yeah. I mean, the biggest thing for me was just this connection between the two cases and the fact that had Beth Holloway not...

paid him $25,000 in exchange for, well, we should go deeper into exactly why she did that. But, you know, essentially she paid him $25,000 for,

her answers about what happened to Natalie. And he went, ended up using that money pretty much directly to go to Peru and kill this other and ends up killing this other girl. And so you do have to ask like, would that have happened had the extortion scheme not happened? And, you know, as, as her lawyer said, he feels he has blood on his hands and,

Beth, of course, felt awful about it. But, you know, the fact that there was this direct connection was, you know, shocking and just so preventable, you would think in hindsight, you know. Absolutely. So, yeah, that for me was the biggest, like, shock.

Kind of wow moment. Yeah, that was the biggest thing for me watching it. Just seeing, like you said in the beginning, how their stories just parallel so much with each other. And even how the family's experiences parallel with each other. Like Beth showing up to the island, wanting answers immediately. Stephanie's father going out right away, looking for her car, finding it in the seedy area. Like the parallels are awful. And the family's experiences are so intertwined. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Another interesting thing was...

the different perspectives on the case and the huge difference in willingness to participate that we found between Peru and Aruba. I wondered about that. Yeah, yeah. In Peru, every door was opened, you know, because I think, you know, just on its face, it's a totally different story in Peru. They got their man, they convicted him, they put him in jail, the body was found, it was open and shut. There's nothing really to hide or regret. Right.

So, you know, everyone who was involved in the case from the lead interrogator to the drivers who drove the getaway car unknowingly to his girlfriend agreed to participate. In Aruba, it was a very different story. A lot of the people we spoke with that had the closest connection to the case that are still there,

literally told us off the record, like, I'll get death threats if I talk to you. Like, people here do not want the media, do not want this in the media anymore. They, they threaten people who speak about it. And so there's, you know, a very concerted effort in Aruba to just make this go away still 18 years later. Definitely. And so nobody wants to talk.

So that kind of complicated it a little bit. But thankfully, there's been so much news coverage of this over the years in Aruba and such a deep archive to draw from that that wasn't really a huge issue.

Definitely. But it would have been nice to get a few more perspectives, current perspectives in Aruba. Who in particular would you have wanted to speak to in Aruba? There were a couple of lawyers who were really close to the case, but more than anything, I would have liked to talk to Yoran's mother, Anita. I could see that. I could definitely see that. Yeah, she's done...

a handful of interviews, nothing really that I've seen since, I believe, 2010 when Stephanie disappeared. I think that she did one interview after that, and then she just decided she couldn't anymore. So it's been a long time since she's spoken publicly, but that would have given us a lot of insight into Joran's history and his early years and stuff. Absolutely. But at the same time, it's fully understandable why she doesn't want to talk and

You have to feel for her as a mother, you know? Oh, yeah. So, but we tried. Yeah, it sounds like there's a complicated relationship there because it sounds like in the beginning, obviously, nobody wants to believe that their son is capable of that. But then to find out that he, I mean, he did get convicted of Stephanie's murder and it's very cut and dry that he did it. So she has to accept that and that must be awful. And you can see it, her kind of evolving attitude.

impression of the case and of Yorin in her interviews where in the early ones in 2005 she's defending him tooth and nail and saying you know he's an honest boy she says he's very loving you know why would anybody you know who has all basically the blessings that he has want to do something like this it just doesn't make any sense and then after Stephanie's death and

2010, you know, she's definitely, you can tell she's just rethinking everything about him and she still loves him, obviously, but, you know, she's, you can just, you can tell she's angry and sad and frustrated. And so it's, you know, his actions affected so many people beyond the two principal victims, you know, his own family, you know, obviously Natalie and Stephanie's families, but

The whole island of Aruba, you know, and the economy there, you know, just had really far reaching consequences for so many people.

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Absolutely. I think there's so many different victims in this, and especially Jorn's mom. One of the things you touched on in the film is that she was actually trying to get him help right before he left for Peru. And that sentiment is just haunting. The fact that she really wanted him to get some kind of help, to talk to a psychiatrist, to even... It sounded like some kind of like inpatient thing even, and then he just disappeared. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She was going to send him back to the Netherlands for an inpatient treatment.

And I know he had seen psychologists through the years. We don't have great details on those, but we know that before Natalie disappeared, he had been seeing one.

So it was no secret in the family that he needed help, but you have to be receptive to the help and, you know, acknowledge that you need it in order for it to work. And as a mother, your first thing is always going to be like, no, of course not my child. Like, sure, they may need a little bit of extra help, but no way could they have done this awful thing that I can't even fathom. But I imagine when the, when, you know, the murder of Stephanie happened, I'm sure it was like,

I don't think he's being caught up in these two things accidentally. Like that realization was probably really hard to hit that second one because it's like, I don't think it's a coincidence that my son is just being placed in these two awful cases with nothing connected to it. So, you know, that was probably the thing that was like that you have to kind of face it at that point.

Yeah. That must have been so hard. Even after he killed Stephanie, he called home to his mother and his mother had heard that they were looking for him in Peru. And she said, you should turn yourself in. And he gave her a whole story about how he didn't, he actually was like, what do you mean? She's dead? Yeah.

Oh, my God. You know, and he said, well, when I left, she was alive. But there were these two shady cops that were, you know, blah, blah, blah. It's just, you know, it just never ends. Yeah, it's interesting. He tries to pin it on two other men always. And there are always stories that sound like they're from like, you know, like action movies or something. Like, I'm like, you're just making things up. Like, it's not even probable. It's really not.

Sad story, you know, all around. Truly. Absolutely. With that being said, what do you think about the latest confession? Well, I, I feel sort of like, you know, as people will see John Kelly and Matt Holloway, Natalie's brother feel, which is not that it's not the whole truth. That's how I feel. I agree. Yeah. I mean, the fundamental truth that he killed her is there and he has never said that outright before. Yeah.

But I think that's where the truth ends. So the details of it include that he, well, I mean, it's just so graphic to even think about, but that he bashed her head in with a cinder block that he had found laying on the beach. So how come a bloody cinder block was never found? You know, that would be a pretty easy thing to, that'd be a hard thing to dispose of and an easy thing to find. Yeah. And then the idea that he just

waded into the water with her and just kind of pushed her off from, you know, he went in waist deep and just pushed her off. So everybody I've spoken with since this came out in Aruba, cause I, you know, I have had a lot of conversations off the record. They're just like, you know, there's with the currents there, that's just not how it would work. He would just wash right back in. Right. So that's just BS. Yeah.

So then you have to wonder. So in that way, the story isn't fully over, you know, because we still don't know what happened aside from the fact that he killed her. So...

The mystery continues on some level. It does. I do wonder if there's some truth in each part of the different stories that he's told. Because at one point, somebody came with a boat and they put her on the boat and then they dropped her off of the boat, even saying that is so awful. But I have to wonder if there's little truths in each variation. Yes. And one of the people we interviewed, Michelle Kosinski, who was an NBC reporter who covered this story for years, said,

said, I don't know if it was on camera or off, but she said to me, the one common denominator that you find in almost all of his stories is some sort of blunt force head trauma. Yeah. So from the very first story, when he said he dropped her off at the Holiday Inn after they'd been out and she fell out of the car and hit her head on the ground, um,

There was one story once that he told about he brought her to a friend's house and she was doing cocaine on the balcony and she fell off the balcony and, you know, fell on her head and died. You know, so there's just been all these iterations of her having some sort of head trauma. And so and the cinder block just being the latest of those. So, you know, it's.

Certainly more likely than not that that was an element in her death. Because it's almost like he's prepared. Like, I think most of him believes she'll never be found and he believes he's taken care of it. He's so confident in himself. Classic. But I think like...

Part of him is also covering for when she is found. I agree. He's keeping that element the same kind of thing. So whenever she was found, it would have that element in it, especially if it's like she fell. It was an accident. She banged her head. If she's found and she banged her head, he told you it was an accident. And at least this one, he's saying he did it. Yeah. Yeah.

It feels like before it might have been like covering for if she was found that I already said it was an accident. I told you she had her head. Yeah. I haven't thought about it like that, but yeah, that's probably true. I think there's definitely... So now I'm like, where is she? Where is she? Because...

Were you a little worried that she would be found? And it's like, and if you were a little worried she would be found and possibly found well enough that we could tell she had head trauma, where is she? Because I don't think she's in the ocean, if that's the case. It makes you think when you start to reflect on all the different stories he has told, your mind just starts to spin.

Because you got to believe there's something within each one. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's the key common denominator there. Then there's the dad who creeps into a couple of the stories and who so many people still believe was complicit in the death and in the cover up. So, you know, that's a whole thing in itself. So that's an interesting part.

What are your thoughts on that, if you want to share? Yeah, I mean, well, it's interesting. He never implicates his father until right after his father's death. And suddenly he's saying, you know, my dad disposed of the body. So, which is cold to begin with. It's like, you know, particularly if it's not true. It's like your dad just died and now you're going to... You're pinning it on him. You're sparing his name. Yeah. Crazy. But I don't know. I mean, I certainly can see a scenario where he was involved.

but I can't go so far as to say he definitely was. And, you know, if he, if he wasn't, then, you know, I just, I feel awful for his family, but, uh,

You know, it's and the other thing that's interesting is that this happened when Joran's mother was back in the Netherlands, that she wasn't home. And so I didn't realize that. Yeah. And so his dad was the only parent around him. His dad. Interesting. Literally would take him to casinos and drink with him and gamble. And so I don't think he was like, you know.

He certainly wasn't a typical relationship. He was he was a friend, not a parent. Yeah, sort of. And so certainly it's possible, you know, as the film shows, Natalie's brother is pretty confident that he was involved.

We spoke to a lawyer on the island. We did interview one who was involved in the case. And, you know, she said without saying that he was involved. She definitely seemed very confident in that. And that made me start to think even more. Yeah. And you do have to wonder, somebody else made the point that Natalie was never found. Whereas when he killed Stephanie and he didn't have his father and he didn't have any help with him.

He just left her in the room. A complete mess. There was no forethought of like, how can I cover this up? There was no attempt to cover it up. He just ran. Yeah, that's the part that gets me. Yeah. Whereas with Natalie, you know, we still don't know what happened to her. And you do have to wonder, was there someone a little smarter, a little more grown up that, you know, stepped in and helped him cover this up? Because...

Stephanie's, you know, the Stephanie incident certainly demonstrates that he doesn't really have that capacity himself.

That's really interesting. Yeah, as much as the two cases parallel, there are really marked differences in the fact that he just leaves her and then goes on the run. And then also with the way he confesses. When he's caught, he does tell a weird story where he was set up and yada yada. But you play the clip in your film of him confessing, and he's so matter-of-fact, so nonchalant about it. What do you think that was where we got so many stories with Natalie, but with Stephanie it was just...

He finally caved and said, yes, I did this. And it didn't take however many years. Yeah. Well, I think a couple of things. He didn't crack until they promised him they would send him back to Aruba. And they basically lied to him to get him to stop lying. So he thought, like, if I tell them, then they'll let me go back to Aruba.

Which is just silly that he could even think that that would happen. But at any rate, there's that. And then there's the fact that they had her body. They had his shirt that was all bloody that he had left in the room. Just so much evidence that he killed her that they confronted him with. And, you know, what are you going to do at that point? Yeah.

Yeah, you kind of have to own up. Yeah, so I don't know. I mean, I wonder if by that point he just felt like he would figure out a way out. You know, even if he told them, you know, point blank, I did it, that he'd find a way. Right. And this time he wasn't able to. And it's crazy that like some of the worst, most diabolical killers fall for like the stupidest things.

Like it reminds me of like BTK with like, if I send you this floppy disk, can you trace it? And they were like, no, don't worry about it. And he was like, cool. Immediately. That's what catches them. It's the same thing. It's like, you'll send me back to Aruba if I said I did this. And they're like, totally. And he's like, all right, here you go.

Like, that's all it takes. It's true. Right. It's crazy. Well, and you want to find some solace in the fact that he is in prison, that, I mean, the sentence is, what, 28 years? Is that right? I think it was 28, but it was then brought up to 35 because he was convicted of stealing cocaine in the prison. Right, which you explore that in the film. That's a whole story in and of itself. Yeah.

So you want to find that solace that he is in prison, but you do kind of touch on the film that the Peruvian prison system is a little bit different than what we would expect here in America. They get to have visitors. I mean, he got married. He had a child while in prison. He ended up with another girlfriend. Can you tell us a little bit about all that? Yeah, we actually filmed it, the first prison he was in. And, you know, it's not a place that you'd want to go like on your honeymoon by any means. No.

So it's certainly different. I mean, there's a lot of rough characters there, but they do have kind of a lot of freedom to roam about during the day. You know, there were a lot of people there meeting with family and lawyers and stuff and people bringing them things. And they're just sitting at like open air tables, almost like you're in a really crappy Starbucks. Oh, man. Yeah.

And yeah, they have, they're allowed, most prisoners are allowed conjugal visits. They're allowed a lot of visitors. And I guess the philosophy is like, just keep them calm, you know, keep them as content as possible so they don't riot, you know? Yeah. So yeah. And then when he came to Alabama to face the charges last year, I started to hear that he couldn't wait to get back to Peru. Oh, I believe it. You know, it's hard to imagine a Peruvian prison being more inviting than...

prison in the United States, but you know, that seems to have been the case. And it's funny, we had a sound guy that worked with us when we did some interviews in Alabama who said his, I think it was his wife's brother or cousin was actually in the same cell block as Yoram and would heckle him all night long every night to keep him awake.

That's amazing. That's incredible. You know, so I hope that guy gets paroled early, you know, but he's doing a good job there. So, yeah, I mean, he obviously was hated by all the prisoners there because he's on Natalie's home turf and.

So he did not enjoy his time in Alabama by any means. Oh, it's a bummer he couldn't stay there. I know. I think a lot of people feel that way. Yeah. Well, that was the biggest disappointment that came out of this for me when I heard the sentence was running concurrent, which means at the same time as his Peruvian sentence was.

meaning he'll get no additional time. It's just such a disappointment, you know? Yeah. But, you know, Beth Holloway seems to be at peace with it, you know, which I guess in the end is all that matters. She does.

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Yeah, exactly. That's the most important piece. She does. You see a stark difference between how Beth feels about it and how Stephanie's father feels about it. Did you feel that when you were making the film? Yeah. Well, I think he can take some satisfaction in the fact that he's serving time for Stephanie's murder. Yeah. One thing that was interesting that he told us was that he's taken...

measures to protect Joran in prison because he doesn't want him to be prematurely killed because he wants him... That gave me chills. Yeah, he wants him to serve the sentence and, like, suffer. That's fascinating. Yeah, so... And he's very well connected there. He actually ran for...

I think some citywide office in Lima. He's kind of a famous race car driver in Peru. And then he ran this, or he still does run this company that like puts on circuses all over Peru. So he's, he's pretty well connected politically and, you know, I think with the police. And so he's been able to protect Yoram. Although there was a story that came out within the last month that Yoram got beat up pretty bad. Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah.

Do you know anything about the circumstances around that? I don't, but there was also a story about that right before he came to Alabama last year. So, you know, I don't think he's got a lot of friends in prison down there. I can't imagine he would be really great at making friends. I think he's good at manipulating people, but I think he's among his own kind there who know what he's doing and know what he's all about. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. He's good at making girlfriends, though.

Yeah. He's very good at that. Can we talk about that a little bit? Because that was a big part of your film that I did not realize. One, that he was married. He got married while in prison. He was able to have a daughter, which that's chilling. And then also was able to make a girlfriend while he's still married. And he sets her up. So do you want to tell us a little bit about that? Yeah, it's just wild that he, you know, because they're allowed visitors in jail, some of his...

cellmates, you know, would start bringing in like friends of their girlfriends for him in exchange, I'm sure for,

you know, him doing something for them, whether it be supplying them with drugs or money or whatever. But so he starts meeting these girls who come in. One of them, he ends up marrying. And, you know, as you mentioned, he has a daughter with who I'm trying to think how old she is. She's probably about nine now, I think. Yeah. And then and she's constantly bringing him things, you know, so he's getting a lot out of

Not only the woman he married, but every girlfriend since, where, you know, they're constantly bringing stuff in for him. And, you know, so, but yeah, he's, he's very charming. And, you know, we interviewed the, you know, the current girlfriend, although there's also been a story that's come out recently that he's got three women now visiting him. She's one of them, but two other, two others. I don't know that the divorce is final, but I think it's in process. Yeah.

So, yeah, and he's just they love him. Like, as you see from the girlfriend we interviewed, he gave her a trinket that she showed us. She also brought a painting to the interview that she he had done.

Oh, my. You know, he sends her all these letters with hearts and stars, she says. Real charmer, you know? And just the weirdest thing is that she said, you know, she was with him for protection, but how is a guy who's behind bars going to protect you from anything? Yeah.

That was rather confusing. And as angry as it seemed like she was at him, because it did seem like she was upset about obviously what ultimately ended up happening where he set her up to bring drugs into the prison. It did still seem like she cared for him in showing the trinket and the key chain. Yeah.

That was interesting. Yeah. Well, what was interesting is that, you know, she's basically said she still loved him, but that she regretted meeting him, ever meeting him. And it seemed to us when we did the interview that it was over between them, but at that point he was in the States. So she may have thought she'd never see him again. And then as soon as he got extra or sent back to Peru late last year, there was a story in the Peruvian press that she was again, visiting him in prison and,

And now two other women are visiting him as well. So I don't know how she feels about that. But clearly she didn't cut all ties, even though she's now...

a fugitive because, you know, he had her smuggling drugs into the prison. And she's a fugitive in Peru, right? Yeah, she is. So you wonder how she's even still visiting. That's the weird thing. You know, she didn't want to tell us where she lives. She met us at a certain place in this town and it was all very hush-hush. And she said, you know, she's worried about like if she gets...

If she gets arrested, what's going to happen to her kids? And she's trying to work under the table to support them. But I didn't get the sense that they're knocking down her door. I feel like the Peruvian authorities have bigger fish to fry. It sounds like that. Yeah, and I feel like they've sort of just...

stopped trying to find her. And yeah, if she's visiting him in jail again, you know, you have to wonder how high priorities. Yeah. How come she's not being arrested or is she going under a different name? But, you know, right. I don't know.

But it's just weird. It's weird. And it's really scary, ultimately, how he can manipulate people. And the fact that he's going to be like late 50s, early 60s when he gets out of prison. Yeah. It's scary to think that everything that happened to Natalie, everything that happened to Stephanie could happen again. Yeah. Yeah. And Beth Holloway even said before anything happened to Stephanie, like, I want this guy to be arrested, apprehended, because this is going to happen again. Yeah. She knew what she was talking about. Yeah. Yeah.

Although you do wonder if like he gets to that last year or so in prison and Stephanie's father calls off the security, you know. That's kind of what fingers crossed on that one. I could see that happening, you know, where he just stops protecting him. That's what I was hoping would happen. Yeah. I guess we'll have to wait and see. But yeah, so he'll be, I think, 56 or 57 when he gets out.

And, you know, somebody like him, a leopard like him doesn't change his spots. So he's not going to come out a reformed man, an upstanding citizen. No, you can see he's doing the same stuff in prison. Everything we were just talking about is what he would do on the streets. Yeah. And it's unfortunately working for him in prison as well to a certain extent. So he's not being shown any kind of, you know,

consequences for his actions. He's still luring women in. He's still getting things. Like, he's not, it's not, it's not on a good path so far. I wonder if that would have differed had he served prison time in the States. Quite possibly. It wouldn't have been, you know, a picnic like it seems to be down there.

No, not at all. Is there anything that we haven't touched on that you wanted to touch on talking about your film? Well, you know, one thing that struck me is just how raw it all still is. Maybe it's partly because of the confession that just came out and the fact that everything was back in the headlines. But we interviewed, as you saw in the film, Natalie's best friend Claire, Natalie's brother, people, even the new Stephanie and...

All these years later, it just does not get any easier. You know, it's just clear that these folks were traumatized for life. And it's just so sad that one person could do that to so many people. Like you said, it affects so many different people. Yeah. It's just really, there were some hard interviews, you know, it was just really emotional and sad and.

It's too bad that these things happen. But I think it's important to tell the stories to particularly to like younger women who didn't grow up with the Natalie story that, you know, aren't aware of it, that are going out all the time. And absolutely, they need to be careful that these guys are out there. Absolutely. It's a cautionary tale in its own right. It really is. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, that's what I took from it.

Yoren is not the only Yoren. No, absolutely not. Unfortunately. We have to always be on our guard. Absolutely. And last question, wrapping things up here. What is the main thing that you want people to feel or reflect on after they finish the documentary? Well, I hope it was a worthy tribute to the two girls that died and to their families and everything they've been through. And as you say, you know, a cautionary tale.

that we can prevent things like this from happening in the future just by being more aware of psychopathy and psychopaths and how they operate. And yeah, so I mean, that's kind of it. It's, you know, it's just one of those stories that, you know, when I first got into it, I didn't realize how many layers there were to it. But yeah, really compelling story to tell, but it takes a lot out of you. So that's part of why I don't do true crime all the time is because, you know, well, I

You know, I think some folks can, well, you guys have a podcast about it, right? So you're able to kind of live with it all the time. It's hard, though. It's hard. We even, we do true crime and paranormal. And sometimes after a couple of cases like this, we have to break and go to something paranormal because it affects you a lot less. Yeah, we'll break into like some, you know, haunted hotel or we'll talk about like some like weird history or something like that just to kind of.

Because it does. It like sits with you. Yeah. And it starts leeching into other parts of your life. And you're like, okay, I'm going to take a minute. Did you do anything after this to kind of self-care after going through all of that? I jumped right on to another project, actually sort of simultaneous to this, actually, which is not true crime, but it's about survivors of Hurricane Ian in Florida. Oh, interesting. And well, not everyone survives. So there's some tragedy to it, but there's also some hope and some...

and, you know, really good people that, you know, I got to meet and interview. So that was in some ways therapeutic, I guess. I could definitely see that. When's that going to be coming out? Yeah.

You know, it's interesting. I'm not sure. It was supposed to be on this month, but now it's actually been so well received internally that they may hold it back until and do a series and make this the first episode of a series, in which case it may not air till next year. Oh, that's great. That's awesome though. Congratulations. Yeah. Yeah. That's great. I'm not sure about it yet, but yeah, it really turned out well. And it was a good way to step away from the dark world of Joran van der Sloot. Yeah. Something that was...

In some ways it's equally dark, but in a different way. Right. But it was caused by mother nature, not by a psychopath. Yeah. A little bit different. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, but yeah, this has been a fun conversation. So thanks for having me. Absolutely. Lighting the,

and hope everybody gets to see it on Peacock. Absolutely. 100%. And like you said, you wanted it to be a tribute to the families. I think you did a great job. I really enjoyed it. Yeah. I think it was awesome. And I think you did a really good job showing both stories like you said you wanted to. So hats off to you. Yeah. Yeah, thanks. Thanks. And it was great to have their participation. Yeah. Their kind of blessing. So that meant a lot. Definitely. I can only imagine. Yeah.

Thank you so much for talking with us. Yeah, thank you so much. This was really great. And everybody go check out Pathological, The Lies of Joran van der Sloot. You are in for a wild ride if you haven't seen it. Do it. Yeah, that's for sure. All right, well, thanks. Thanks again. I appreciate it. It was fun. Thank you.

Guys, that was amazing. That went so well. I always get so nervous before interviews. I know, I do too. Especially like you and I will usually switch off like who's going to take lead on it. And when it's one of our turn to take lead where the other one is like, you got this. You're like Barbara Walters. You're Barbara.

I like to now think of myself as Alex Cooper. I like that. Oh, there you go. She's become the gold standard. She's this generation's Babs. Yeah, I'm into it. Yeah, I love it. Alex Cooper forever. Shout out to her. You were amazing. Thank you. You did really well. I just got to give it to you. Thanks. Ash can think on her feet when it comes to interview questions. I had to. Hats off. I had written down some questions in prep, like a lot, and then we just ended up going through

a lot of them and I was like fuck I have I have a lot more to come up with on the fly but it worked out and he was so great at giving us a lot of information and a lot to like continue to build upon that's the thing when you have a good guest it's like it's so easy to because then you have more questions organically you're just like wait a second you're interesting I want to ask you more exactly so thank you Chris yeah thank you to Chris Cassell and that's

You ruled. You ruled. And everybody go check out Peacock's Pathological, The Lies of Joran Vandersloot. Do it. And we hope you keep listening. And we hope you keep hearing. But not so weird that you don't go check out that documentary because you'd be a silly fool if you didn't. Don't have silly goose behavior and not do that. Come on. Come on.

I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York. I was like at my locker and she came up to me and she was like stuttering super bad. I'm like, stop f***ing around. She's like...

I can't. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast. It's like doubling and tripling, and it's all these girls. With a diagnosis the state tried to keep on the down low. Everybody thought I was holding something back. Well, you were holding something back intentionally. Yeah, well, yeah.

Is this the largest mass hysteria since The Witches of Salem? Or is it something else entirely? A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, Hysterical.

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