LIMA, Peru – The lone suspect in the disappearance of U.S. teen Natalee Holloway was paraded – moist-eyed and looking stunned – before reporters Saturday as Peruvians denounced him and detectives began interrogating him about the killing of a Lima student.
Joran van der Sloot arrived at criminal police headquarters in a brown Interpol SUV and was escorted across an auditorium crowded with shouting, shutter-snapping journalists three times.
Wearing a green bulletproof vest, his hands handcuffed behind him, the husky 22-year-old stared straight ahead and didn’t respond to reporters’ questions or make eye contact.
Outside, seven Indian shamans in brightly colored ponchos repeatedly stabbed a cloth doll representing van der Sloot in a “spiritual punishment” ritual. “We’re punishing him so that all the forces of evil are purged,” one shouted.
About an hour earlier, onlookers yelled insults at the man who has dominated Peruvian front pages as police switched cars south of the foggy coastal capital.