When Natalee Holloway vanished from Aruba in 2005, never to be seen again, it set into motion a chain of suffering, uncertainty, death, and incarceration that lingers still 28 years later.

For her mother, Beth Holloway, it meant never seeing her 18-year-old pursue her dream of a career in medicine.

“Natalee will be 18 forever in my heart,” Beth wrote in a federal court victim impact statement.

“Natalee would be 36 years old now. I think about what kind of doctor she would have become. She would be married. Have children. My grandchildren.”

Van der sloot, also now 36, on Wednesday pleaded guilty to extorting Beth Holloway, falsely promising to lead her to Natalee’s body in exchange for $250,000.

“She was smart, and so accomplished, and I have no doubt she would have made all her dreams come true. She had real hope. The hope that filled her heart fills mine, and I will wake up every day remembering who she was,” Holloway said.

As part of that plea, van der Sloot confessed to bludgeoning Natalee to death after she fought off his sexual advances on a beach and dragging her body into the ocean.

“For 18 years you have denied killing my daughter Natalee,” Holloway said in the written statement.

“Your lies and manipulation, taunting us with fake news interviews and wild stories of what happened to her, have caused indescribable pain and harm to my family and me. The grief I feel lives way down deep in my soul.”

Though Holloway said she was relieved to finally have answers, she is left with the aching loss inflicted by the death of her daughter.

“You destroyed all of this. You terminated her potential, her dreams and her possibilities when you bludgeoned her to death I 2005,” Holloway said. “You took away my son’s big sister. You changed the course of our lives and turned them upside down.”

Others too suffered as a result of van der Sloot’s violence and lies, Holloway said.

“I have wondered over the years about the grief your mother has experienced. I’ve thought about how you destroyed her life, your brothers’, your grandmother’s and everyone around you.

“And what about your daughter? Imagine that one day get a call that your daughter has vanished, then you find out years later that a big bully who forced himself on her didn’t get what he wanted so he violently murdered her.

“Imagine that.

“I’ve wondered if the stress you caused your father, Paulus, contributed to his heart attack and sudden death. You are to blame for all their suffering.”

Paulus van der Sloot died in 2010 of a heart attack while playing tennis, months after his son was jailed for the murder of Stefany Flores, a Peruvian business student whom he met while playing poker in a Lima casino.

“Your life was pretty much over in 2010 when you extorted me and then killed another beautiful young woman in Peru, five years to the day after you killed Natalee,” Holloway said.

He is to be held in a Peruvian prison until 2043 for Flores’ death.

Should he be released before then, he will be extradited to serve the rest of a 20 year sentence for extortion and wire fraud in America.

“You are the one thing no one in Aruba wants to be: the black mark,” Holloway said.

Holloway said the pain of Natalee’s death has hurt her in many ways.

“Extreme emotional loss and pain really can’t be comprehended by those who haven’t lived a devastating tragedy like ours, and I have also suffered great professional and financial loss.

“When you killed Natalee, I lived in Aruba trying to find her and lost my teaching license and my tenure. I had to go back to school to get my license reinstated, and then had to work harder to get my tenure back.

“Since 2010 when you extorted me and tried to sell me her bodily remains, I incurred attorney and investigative expenses that totaled about $215,000 and what she called “killer” fees.

“I paid my daughter’s killer. It’s pretty shocking.”

Although he cannot be tried for her death in America and likely will not be in Aruba, Beth Holloway will live with happy memories while he lingers in prison for another murder and extortion.

“Joran, while you’re living your life in prison until you’re an old man, and by the way, you look like hell Joran, I don’t see how you’re going to make it, I’ll live the rest of my life with wonderful memories of a beautiful young lady who had her whole life in front of her.”