Natalee Holloway’s killer claimed a medium appeared in a white light inside his cell and gave him ‘white horse’ as a secret code

Netflix loves its docuseries and true crime documentaries, and Taken: Natalee Holloway is the latest story to climb the rankings. This three-part documentary covers the 2005 murder of Natalee Holloway.

A key character is Joran van der Sloot, who confessed in 2023 to killing Natalee. Before that confession, he would tell various stories about what happened to Natalee, such as saying she fell asleep on the beach or that it was a seizure that killed her.

With the renewed interest in the case from the documentary, The Tab found an interview that Van der Sloot gave in 2013 to Dutch media. Some of his stories about what happened to Natalee might’ve toed the line between believable and not, but this story about his own time in prison might be the toughest to believe.

Van der Sloot claims he had a supernatural visit in prison

This isn’t the story of visitation from ghosts or angels. No, what Van der Sloot described would be considered astral projection because his visitor was a person who was alive at that time. Astral projection is basically when somebody’s consciousness or spirit leaves their body to go somewhere else.

Van der Sloot said in the interview, “I was sitting in my cell, severely depressed. I suddenly saw a white light, and I looked in that direction, and there was someone standing there. I thought: Maybe there is someone inside. But it was a Dutchman who started speaking to me. He introduced himself as the paranormal medium Robbert van den Broeke. He said that he had come to reassure me and: ‘I don’t want you to do crazy things.’ I am afraid that you want to harm yourself.”

Apparently, Van den Broeke gave Van der Sloot a code word that would prove the visit was real, which was “white horse.” So, he asked his lawyer to reach out to Van den Broeke, as he was unable to do so himself, and ask for the code, and Van den Broeke allegedly responded with “white horse” as the code word.

Van den Broeke says the visit happened

The same Dutch media apparently got into contact with Van den Broeke about the matter, who said, “There are many people who see me appear. I felt that I could give Joran peace and security, and suddenly it was as if I were present there; I saw his cell. I communicated with him through thoughts. I felt a lot of love flowing towards him again; it was as if old pains could be processed within him.”

With Van den Broeke in particular, part of his claim is that he can take photographs and have the deceased appear in them. You can find several defenders who don’t believe he could fake the photos, but one blogger goes through how his tricks could be faked, even diving into the manual of the camera that was used.

There’s no way to confirm that Van der Sloot actually experienced this, or that Van den Broeke’s account is accurate. People have experiences with psychics where they claim that their predictions were correct, but there is no scientific evidence that anyone can truly communicate psychically.

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