My weekend SM project - just posted this at the Murder & Crime thread (see my sig line).
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American Society of Travel Agents
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Alexandria, VA 22314
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The National Association of Commissioned Travel Agents
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703-739-6826
This is a long message. I beg you to bear with me and read it through.
I am among many individuals who have followed the Natalee Holloway disappearance on Aruba – I am sure you are familiar with the subject. I read and post on several internet forums, primarily
http://www.scaredmonkeys.net .
A column by David Grossman, a travel writer for
USAToday, recently stated that Aruba had had "one murder in 20 years". The column subsequently has been edited (due, I think, to reaction from folks like me). He was quoting from a speech by Dr. Peter Tarlow at a tourism or travel agents meeting. Here is a link to the column as it now stands; notice the Editors Note at the beginning, and the current reference to “a handful of murders a year,” which is not the original wording:
http://tinyurl.com/mg6ju .
(Of course, "a handful" of murders is hardly a good recommendation. That handful exceeds the murder rate in the U.S. Read on.)
As a result of that original “1 in 20” statement, at the “scared monkeys” site, we began a new thread called
Murder & Crime Rate in Aruba. We are collaborating on a list of murders and other violent crimes that have occurred there. Here is a link to the beginning of that discussion:
http://tinyurl.com/fau6z .
Our purpose is to show that Aruba deliberately and officially obscures violent crimes in the interest of tourism. For example, we believe that at least seven (7) murders (counting Miss Holloway) occurred in 2005. That’s considerably higher than the ratio touted to the travel industry – “one in 20 years,” “2.4 per year” are figures I have read. In fact, it is higher than the murder rate for the United States, according to FBI just-released statistics for the year 2005. (Link provided below.)
And more important, we believe that the deception alone constitutes good reason for Aruba to be on the U.S. State Department travel warning list, and for travel agents to make certain potential travelers are aware of the facts, as opposed to what Aruba "promotes". (We have sent our information to the State Department.)
Because what it means is that if serious harm comes your way, Aruba Law Enforcement -- with official blessing – will try to write that incident off as a suicide, accident, or other non-nefarious cause. Unless there’s relentless pressure from the victim’s family and a media blitz, they’ll get away with it.
As recently as Spring 2006, the Polis Chief stated that he believed Miss Holloway died from an accidental, self-induced overdose. He did not speculate as to what she then did with her corpse.
You can imagine how difficult it is to pull this information together. We are trying to read online versions of local newspapers, but most of them are not in English – Dutch, Papiamento, and Spanish are the local languages. (If you have ever tried “babblefish” or similar as a translator, you know what we’re going through … especially with Papiamento, which is the language for
Diario, which has the largest circulation.) We only began this particular endeavor recently, and back issues are not readily available to us.
We initially only were looking for reported murders, but lately are suspicious about suicides, accidents, and other seemingly non-nefarious deaths. We have a recent
Diario article suggesting that some cases deemed to be suicides during the last 20 years may have been due to foul play.
Diario 1/6/2006 article (excerpts):
High Command in Holland wants to conduct DNA tests on all suicide victims
Among other things, it is mentioned that with suicide cases, it is desired for all these cases, that DNA tests be conducted on the bodies.
Two unsolved cases were illustrated, in the first instance the victim committed suicide but it resulted later after the test, that this was not the case
.
Here is another example: on April 5, 2006, a man’s body was found near a cave. His body was crucified, burned, and otherwise unspeakably mutilated. This death was ruled a suicide or overdose, but “evidence has been sent to Holland for testing”. Admittedly I have not seen an outcome, but “evidence to Holland” has become an ominous joke to followers of the Holloway case. Meanwhile – what about the timely investigation that should have been underway?
Amigoe June 8 2006 article (excerpts):
ARUBA — Dinesh ‘Pitbull’ Djoegan had died of overdoses cocaine. At this moment, the Public Prosecutor (OM) does not have evidence that the 25-year old man that was found dead in the vicinity of the Guadirikiri cave on April 5th was murdered. Four suspects have been arrested and the examining magistrate has prolonged the custody of one of them with 8 days.
On Tuesday, Pitbull’s widow and her mother had talked with the district attorney, who leads the investigation on the death of Djoegan. The OM does not comment on the contents of this conversation. All they said was that in order to determine the cause of death, they had to send tests to the Netherlands. The family was informed that Pitbull was not murdered, but had an amount of cocaine in his body. There is a possibility that he was forced to take the drug. The OM is also investigating the relation between the cause of death and the fact that Djoegan was found burned and crucified.
We have another article re. a ship passenger who died on board. When the ship docked at Aruba, an autopsy suggested that death was due to natural causes. But when the body was returned to the man’s home country, another autopsy revealed that he had been strangled, and that there were visible indications of violence. The good news is that as a High Seas death, Interpol is investigating. The bad news is that, partly as a result of Aruba’s misdiagnosis, precious time was wasted. I am betting that the ship and/or its crew are closely connected to Aruba.
Diario 3/20/2006 article (excerpts):
ORANJESTAD (AAN): It seems that in Aruba, authorities immediately ‘guli manda abao’ [swallowed?] the story of the crew members of the ‘Rachel S’ ship, which arrived in Aruba the Sunday of Carnaval Grandi with a dead person on board.
There is a big possibility that the crew members ‘played a comedy’ which apparently turned bad, to cover up a possible crime that was committed on board.
The autopsy conducted in Aruba deduced that Bernard Ramsaran, 50 years of age, died of heart failure.
But now, an autopsy conducted in his country of Trinidad & Tobago, has deduced that Bernard died of something more sinister, ‘traumatic asphyxia’, which indicates that [he] was strangled and choked! His death is nothing natural! It is a crime which took place on the high seas and now Interpol is involved.
The question is, how could Aruban authorities not discover this? The Trinidad & Tobago authorities discovered that Bernard’s body even had several marks of violence.
There is every indication that corruption is entrenched at high and low levels of government. “Recreational” drugs are illegal on Aruba, but are available in abundance and overlooked. According to the C.I.A. World Factbook, Aruba is a “transit point for US- and Europe-bound narcotics with some accompanying money-laundering activity.” (Drugs are not illegal in Holland.) Now, drug availability may be a reason for some tourists to choose Aruba. But drug traffic on this scale, combined with the casinos, and money laundering, invites criminal activity and corruption.
Don’t get me started on the prostitution, pornography and sex-slave angles (including child porn). Suffice it to say that many are convinced that this is what happened to Miss Holloway. They compare her to 1998 cruise passenger Amy Bradley, who some believe to have been abducted into the sex industry.
The clubs and casinos do not enforce age restrictions re. alcohol and gambling, for tourists or locals. When local kids are gambling away a few hundred dollars, and spending maybe $25-$50 on alcohol, several nights a week, one wonders where their money is coming from. They seem to roam the clubs and casinos in packs; some don’t even have a driver’s license yet. I wouldn't want to spend a vacation in another country surrounded by local gangs of teenagers.
All of this -- on an island of less than 100,000 population. While some like to compare the U.S. murder rate to that of Aruba (which is whatever Aruba decides to say it is), FBI statistics show that Aruba compares poorly.
Although I am not expert as to Aruba’s political standing, I perceive that it is more than less independent from The Netherlands (unlike Bonaire and Curaçao). There is no pressure, martial law, FBI or similar outside intervention available - no accountability.
Those who dismiss the Natalee Holloway story as “another missing white girl” have no idea what reality is on the ground in Aruba. This is NOT like most media sensations. The investigation was inept by any country’s law enforcement standards, but Aruba neither acknowledges that or attempts to correct it. Further, I think as much official energy has been expended trashing the victim and her family, as on the investigation.
Please do not ignore the many things that are very wrong on that one happy island. U.S. travelers may still choose to go to Aruba, but if they perform due diligence, please don’t give them the wrong impression.
For a summary of our findings on murder in Aruba, look for this heading:
Summary - Murder & Crime on Aruba -
Most Recent Year first as of 9/15/2006 at this link (page 6):
http://tinyurl.com/zjmaz .
For FBI 2005 statistics on murder in the United States, look for this heading:
U.S. 2005 Statistics -
Murder and Non-Negligent Manslaughter at this link (page 7); links to the FBI tables are there:
http://tinyurl.com/gaoef .
Also on that page, Page 7, is a translation of an ad the Aruba travel promoters recently ran in local papers. The purpose of the ad was to show how little crime, and reduction in crime figures over four years. No homicides are mentioned. See the Page 7 posts for 9/21/2006 at 6:52 a.m. and 9:15 a.m. We have now learned that the Aruba police union is disputing those figures, and claiming the crime rate has increased rather than decreased. For more about the dispute, see the post on Page 7, at 9/29/2006, 8:30 a.m.
You see, if that's the information your industry looks to, it's wrong, wrong, wrong. Just because they don't mention rapes and murders, doesn't mean they don't happen.
Please try to read the entire discussion at the web site. Some incidents are duplicated, but it's only 7 pages, and you will understand how this information has been compiled.
And most important - please try to ensure that U.S. travel agencies are NOT giving false reassurance to potential vacationers to Aruba.
If I can provide any more information to you - or perhaps in another format - please let me know. Thank you so much for your time.
< msmarple redacts personal info >
