Joran van der Sloot, the chief suspect in the disappearance of Natalee Holloway, has admitted to beating the young Alabama woman to death on an Aruban beach, AP reports.

Van der Sloot's admission came as he pleaded guilty to extorting Holloway's mother, thereby resolving a case that has held public attention for nearly two decades.

While he is not charged in Holloway's death, van der Sloot's attempt to extort a quarter of a million dollars from Natalee's mother in exchange for information about her daughter's whereabouts provided investigators with a critical link to the 2005 killing.

Following this development and after seeing van der Sloot in a U.S. courtroom, the Holloway family announced that they were moving on from years of doubt and uncertainty.

"Joran van der Sloot is no longer the suspect in my daughter's murder. He is the killer," said Beth Holloway, Natalee's mother.

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Joran van der Sloots Speaks

Van der Sloot, now 36, admitted to killing Natalee Holloway with a cinder block on an Aruban beach after she rejected his sexual advances, CNN noted.

According to a transcript of an interview with his attorney, Holloway had kneed him in the crotch after he made unwelcome advances, leading him to respond by kicking her in the face and striking her with the cinder block. Subsequently, he decided to push her into the ocean.

Natalee Holloway's body has never been found, and in 2012, an Alabama judge declared her legally deceased.

The deaths of Holloway in 2005 and Stephany Flores, a Peruvian woman, in 2010, for which van der Sloot had previously admitted guilt, led to a 20-year federal sentence on the extortion and wire fraud charges.

Judge Anna Manasco, acknowledging van der Sloot's confession to the brutal murder of Natalee Holloway, condemned his acts, stating that he had brutally murdered two women who had refused his sexual advances in separate incidents years apart.

The judge also stated that Holloway's body would never be found.

Van der Sloot had been arrested multiple times in connection with Holloway's disappearance in the past but was released by Aruban authorities due to a lack of direct evidence.

Currently serving a 28-year prison sentence in Peru for the 2010 murder of Flores, he was convicted of trafficking cocaine into his prison in 2021 and sentenced to an additional 18 years.

According to court documents, under Peruvian law, his prison sentences cannot exceed a total of 35 years, making his scheduled release from prison in Peru around June 10, 2045, 35 years after his original arrest in Peru.

Van der Sloot was temporarily released to the U.S. in June 2021 to face extortion and wire fraud charges.

According to the plea agreement, his 20-year U.S. federal sentence will be served concurrently with his sentence in Peru, making it unlikely that he will return to the U.S. to serve prison time.

Natalee Holloway Case

Natalee Holloway disappeared on a high school graduation trip to Aruba in 2005. She was last seen leaving a bar with van der Sloot, who, at the time, was 17 years old, according to PEOPLE.

Despite being arrested several times in connection to her disappearance, van der Sloot was never charged.

The Holloway family has relentlessly sought answers about the disappearance, and van der Sloot has provided inconsistent accounts over the years, including false claims about where Holloway's remains were located.

Five years after the killing, an FBI sting operation recorded the extortion attempt in which van der Sloot asked Beth Holloway to pay him $250,000 in exchange for information about her daughter's body.

He agreed to accept $25,000 upfront and requested the remaining $225,000 once the remains were found.

READ MORE: 4-Year-Old Kid Finds Gun in Van Shoots 2-Year-Old Sibling 

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written by: Bert Hoover

WATCH: Audio: Joran Van Der Sloot confesses to murdering Natalee Holloway - From AL.com