New suspect detained in Natalee Holloway case

? Dutch police have detained a man on suspicion of participating in the kidnapping and killing of Natalee Holloway last year in Aruba, the suspect’s lawyer said Sunday.

Gerard Spong said his client, whose name was not disclosed, was suspected of “assisting in the murder” of the Alabama high school senior.

The charge is the most severe “in our criminal code,” Spong said on the Netherlands national television broadcaster, NOS.

Holloway was 18 when she went missing in May 2005 during a graduation trip to the Dutch Caribbean island of Aruba with classmates. She was last seen leaving a bar with three young men on May 30.

Dutch marines, the Aruban Coast Guard, the FBI and hundreds of volunteers have all searched the island and coastal areas of Aruba for Holloway, to no avail.

The suspect was arrested Wednesday and is being questioned in the city of Utrecht, Spong said. The suspect has not been formally charged. The questioning was to continue today, he said.

Spong said he planned to file a suit today to prevent his client from being extradited to Aruba.