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Alabama Teen Still Missing in ArubaBy MICHAEL NORTON, Associated Press Writer

ORANJESTAD, Aruba -- Natalee Holloway disappeared on the last night of a trip to Aruba to celebrate her graduation from high school. Four days later, the Alabama teenager is still missing, despite an extensive search of the Dutch Caribbean island.

"Honestly, at the beginning, we were hopeful the girl would come back," said police Superintendent Jan van der Straaten. "Today, we are more and more thinking about the possibility of a crime."

ADVERTISEMENT  On the island remarkable for its absence of violent crime, hundreds of residents and tourists posted fliers to help the hunt. FBI agents helped the Dutch military and Aruba police scour outlying scrubland with helicopters and all-terrain vehicles but found no trace of the 18-year-old.

Aruba radio and television stations broadcast a reward offer from Holloway's family, though they did not specify an amount. The family promised to reward anyone who brings her safely to a police station or hospital.

"Everybody has been quite supportive," the teenager's mother, Beth Holloway Twitty, told The Associated Press. "I am not leaving. I am going to have Natalee with me."

Holloway came to Aruba for a five-day excursion with 124 seniors and 40 chaperons from Mountain Brook High School, near Birmingham, Ala. She was last seen around 2 a.m. Monday, Attorney General Caren Janssen said Thursday.

Police discount the possibility she left the island, because they found her passport in her hotel room, van der Straaten said.

Hopes were lifted briefly just before midnight Thursday when a news photographer said he had seen Holloway on the west side of the island. Police rushed to the scene but found an island girl who fit the description but had brown hair, not Holloway's long blond tresses.

Dressed in the same blue-and-green striped, low-cut blouse and denim miniskirt that she wore at the beach earlier in the day, Holloway spent Sunday evening partying at Carlos 'N Charlie's, a popular restaurant and dance spot where tourists and locals meet in the capital, Oranjestad.

She left 10 minutes before closing at 1 a.m., said the restaurant's master of ceremonies Jose Hernandez, 38. "Nothing was out of the ordinary."

Friends saw her getting into a vehicle outside the nightclub. She did not show up to catch her flight Monday. Her stepmother, Robin Holloway, said Natalee was last seen with a local resident who claimed to be a foreign exchange student.

Police questioned and released three Aruban students who said they dropped Holloway off early Monday at the Holiday Inn where she had been staying, about three miles from Oranjestad, said police assistant inspector Jules Sambo.

"We don't have any indication as to if she is alive," Sambo said. "The whole population is aware that she is missing. The police are doing everything to find her."

Several family members arrived the day after she disappeared. Her mother and her father, David Holloway of Meridian, Miss., went on television Thursday night to appeal to residents for information.

"Natalee is a well-traveled teenager. She has traveled to Europe, Canada," family spokeswoman Marcia Twitty told ABC's "Good Morning America."

She added that Holloway would not get into a car with strangers. "This is totally, totally out of character for Natalee," she said.

The island of 72,000 off the coast of Venezuela has a reputation of being all but free of crime for tourists.

There was one murder and six rapes last year and two murders and three rapes this year. But all the rapes were committed by local men against local women. The two murders involved drug addicts who died in knife fights.

"Aruba is a happy island and a safe island," said Janssen, the attorney general. "We're looking everywhere."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-aruba-missing-girl,1,2539082.story?coll=sns-ap-world-headlines  

According to morning news Natalie got into a car with three local men.  Her friends saw her leave a night club at about 1:30 in the morning.  I have several questions. First, why on earth would anyone's friends allow them to get into a car with strangers?  Don't we all know better than that especially by high school age?  Secondly, why didn't anyone notice she never made it back to the hotel to begin with?  While, I haven't heard about a roomate I assume she was sharing her room with at least one other person, since this is how most (probably almost all) school trips are booked.  I just don't understand how noone noticed she was missing until they were at the airport the next morning.  I think there are a lot of missing pieces.  I am not blaming her friends, but I just don't understand how anyone could allow this to happen to their friend; friends are supposed to look out for each other.