Police say van der Sloot Ate Next to Flores Dead Body

by hearit

Peru police say Joran van der Sloot has confessed that he enjoyed a cocktail of coffee and marijuana in the minutes following Flores' murder. Police say the Dutchman told officers he not only took time out for a coffee break, but sat next to Flores' corpse and munching on biscuits while trying to figure out how to dispose of Flores' murdered body.
 
"I was going to use one of my suitcases to take her [Flores' dead body] out of the hotel, but I didn't do it because I was afraid someone [would] stop me carrying my luggage without paying," van der Sloot allegedly told police, says La Republica. Police say van der Sloot broke Stephany Flores' neck during a rage, after van der Sloot says she'd used his laptop to research his involvement in the case of missing teen Natalee Holloway, an 18-year-old Alabama girl who went missing in Aruba in May 2005.
 
"I did not want to do it," Peru police say van der Sloot has said about killing Flores. "The girl intruded into my private life. She had no right. I went to her, and I hit her. She was scared. We argued, and she tried to escape. I grabbed her by the neck, and I hit her."
 
Authorities say van der Sloot says he was high on marijuana (pot) at the time of the Stephany Flores murder. The New York Daily News says van der Sloot had debated tossing Flores' body into the ocean-markedly similar to circumstances suspected in the Natalee Holloway disappearance, where a body was never found. Peru police report they found maps charting ocean currents, in his backpack.
 
Police say that after Flores had been murdered and van der Sloot realized that he could not hide Flores' body, van der Sloot showered, changed clothes and grabbed some belongings before leaving the murder scene. Flores' dead body was in a room registered in in van der Sloot's name, in Lima, Peru-not discovered until three days later, on June 2. Peru police say Van der Sloot was in police custody only three days before his alleged confession and charges are expected to be filed tomorrow by Peruvian police.
 
Joran van der Sloot's lawyer states, "Joran told his mother crying Monday that he was being interrogated under reasonably barbaric conditions," reports the Peruvian media. "He said the police were trying to force him [van der Sloot] to confess" to the murder of Flores. In a second interview provided to CBS News by van der Sloot's attorney, de Rooij said van der Sloot also told his mother that he was being interrogated in a "very rude way" and that he thought the Peruvian authorities were "aiming at a coerced confession."
 
Peruvian officials insist van der Sloot is being treated well-however van der Sloot's lawyers are attempting to have his confession to the Flores murder thrown out, saying his legal counsel was not present at the time of his interrogation by Peruvian police. "They have a tendency to do things different over there [in Peru] and could have used extraordinary means, but the burden of proof is pretty much on the defendant," said Gregory D. Lee, a nationally syndicated columnist and retired supervisory special agent for the DEA. "Of course he [van der Sloot] is going to say that [he was coerced] no matter if he was or wasn't," Lee said. "I think he's trying to elicit sympathy. Think about it: You got the media looking at him to see the physical condition of the guy moments after his arrest and after his initial interrogation. He looked fine, and that goes a long way in thwarting any notion that he got coerced or beat up."