Holloway Suspect's Family: Enough Is Enough

Feb. 7, 2006 — -- Since Natalee Holloway's disappearance in May, the van der Sloots have reluctantly become Aruba's most famous family.

Joran van der Sloot, 18, admitted meeting Holloway in a bar on May 30 and going with her to the beach, along with two friends, Satish Kalpoe, 18, and Deepak Kalpoe, 21. The Alabama teenager hasn't been seen since.

The three young men were considered suspects from the beginning, and though they were held by police for questioning, they were never charged with a crime. For the last eight months, Holloway's mother, Beth Holloway Twitty, has mounted a one-woman campaign against the Kalpoes and, particularly, van der Sloot and his family.

The van der Sloots are now speaking out, saying their son has been unfairly singled out.

"They point fingers at him from the beginning. They called this a murder case from the beginning. They only had that tunnel vision," Anita van der Sloot, Joran's mother, told "Good Morning America."

The van der Sloots say they understand Twitty's relentless search for her daughter.

"That, that she's not giving up, for her girl, that we understood, but that she is calling our son a rapist, that -- that's awful," said Joran's father, Paul van der Sloot.

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While the van der Sloots have said in the past that Twitty is "always welcome" in Aruba, they are feeling less charitable toward her, saying she has gone too far and seriously hurt their family.

"I think that when she wants to talk, we will talk. But, of course, she has to explain something. I think she has done a lot of damage to Joran and our family," Paul van der Sloot said.

The van der Sloots say they -- and their son -- have received bags of mail and e-mail, most of it supportive. But not everyone is a fan.

"They threaten to murder him, to kidnap his brothers and torture them," Anita van der Sloot said. "And it's, it's disgusting. I can hardly read them."

The case continues to captivate the public and the media -- cable-news hosts such as Fox's Greta van Susteren have taken up Twitty's cause, calling Joran a liar and sometimes worse.

"It hurts. It really hurts. Why are people doing this? Is this only about ratings, and this is not about truth at all?" Anita van der Sloot asked. "How many people are missing all over the world, in the States? And if this attention that this case gets from the media -- I think every parent of a missing child should deserve the same attention."

The van der Sloots say they want to move on.

"But enough has been enough," she said. "We are parents of a young boy who needs to continue his life."