Peru moves Van der Sloot to tougher prison

Dutch citizen Joran van der Sloot, who is serving a 28year sentence for the 2010 murder of a Peruvian woman, was transferred to a maximumsecurity prison for threatening the warden of the penitentiary where he was being held, officials told Efe Monday.

Van der Sloot, notorious as the chief suspect in the 2005 disappearance of 18yearold U.S. student Natalee Holloway in Aruba, responded with threats when an illegal cellphone was confiscated from him, officials of the Inpe prisons administration said.

He was subsequently transferred from Piedras Gordas penitentiary, on the outskirts of Lima, to the Challapalca prison, which sits at an altitude of 4,800 meters (15,737 feet) in a remote area of southern Peru where temperatures can plunge from 9 C (48 F) in the daytime to minus 20 C (minus 4 F) at night.

The length of Van der Sloot’s stay in Challapalca will depend on his behavior, Inpe officials said.

If he behaves properly he could be transferred soon to another prison with better accommodations, such as are available at Piedras Gordas.

Before being transferred, Van der Sloot recorded a video in which he showed the conditions in his cell, later saying that it was warden Sergio Haro who provided him with the cellphone that was later confiscated.

“The warden himself gave it to me. I don’t know why, but I suspect that it was to set a trap for me,” said Van der Sloot in a portion of the video broadcast on Sunday on Peruvian television.

Now 26, Van der Sloot was sentenced in 2012 to 28 years behind bars for the 2010 murder in Lima of Stephany Flores, a young woman he met at a casino and later killed for her money and credit cards.