On Thursday the 12th January 2012, Natalie Holloway was declared legally dead by a judge. Holloway went missing more than 6 years ago during a high school graduation trip to the Caribbean Island of Aruba. The Judge in Alabama, Alan King signed the order at the close of a hearing in a Birmingham courtroom.

In attendance were Holloway’s divorced parents, Dave and Beth Holloway. In September Dave told the judge that he believed that his daughter had died and he wanted to sop payments on her medical insurance. The reason for this was so that he could use Natalie’s $2,000 college fund to help her younger brother.

The hearing on Thursday was scheduled way ahead before Joran Van Der Sloot plead guilty on Wednesday to the murder of a woman in Lima in 2010. Joran was a suspect in Holloway’s disappearance. Natalie disappeared in Aruba on the 30th May 2005.

Holloway was last seen leaving a bar early that morning with Van Der Sloot. Despite numerous searches and massive attention from the media her body was never found. Holloway’s mother initially object to the petition by Dave to have Natalie declared death but her lawyer said that she changed her mind once she understood the intentions of her ex-husband.