Van der Sloot Pleads Guilty

Joran van der Sloot pled guilty Wednesday to the 2010 murder of Stephany Flores, a 21-year-old Peruvian woman he met at a Lima casino. Flores was killed on the fifth anniversary of the day that 19-year-old Natalee Holloway went missing in Aruba—a disappearance in which van der Sloot had long been suspected of playing a role. Van der Sloot, 24, said last week he would “sincerely confess” to Flores’s murder in a plea strategy aimed at reducing his prison term—a “sincere confession” is thought to generate less prison time in Peru that a straight guilty plea. Van der Sloot told police he strangled Flores in a Lima hotel room in an attempt to rob her. A judge adjourned the trial until Friday, saying van der Sloot would be sentenced then.