Van der Sloot Will "Paralyze the Process" in Murder Trial, Says Report
LIMA, Peru (CBS/AP) After a judge denied a defense motion to void the confession of Joran van der Sloot on Friday in the murder of Stephany Flores, van der Sloot's attorney, Maximo Altez, said he would appeal the decision all the way to the Supreme Court, according to a report.
PICTURES: Van der Sloot Hotel Room Crime Scene
Altez previously told The Associated Press that he would appeal the judge's decision to a higher court, and CNN reports that Altez has said van der Sloot's strategy is to "paralyze the process."
Altez told CNN that van der Sloot will use every possible law available to him, and will even reach out to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in Costa Rica once he has exhausted his options in Peru.
Criminal law expert, Jose Balcazar, told the AP that van der Sloot can continue the appeal but "that will not hold up the case against him."
According to the chief judge of Lima's Superior Court, Cesar Vega, Peruvian laws allow up to six months for murder trials, but legal expert Mario Amoretti said that in practice, cases like van der Sloot's can last 18 months, and that the defense is likely to drag the case out.
Superior Court Judge Wilder Casique rejected the habeus corpus motion on behalf of van der Sloot, who is jailed pending trial on charges of first-degree murder and robbery in the May 30 death of Flores, whom van der Sloot met playing poker in a casino and whose body was found in his hotel room.
Van der Sloot also remains the sole suspect in the unresolved 2005 disappearance of U.S. teen Natalee Holloway on the Caribbean island of Aruba.
Casique noted in a statement that van der Sloot had, in addition to the lawyer, been afforded a Dutch-Spanish interpreter vetted by the Dutch Embassy.
Van der Sloot recanted the confession in a jailhouse interview with the Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf, claiming it was made under duress.
If convicted, van der Sloot faces between 15 and 35 years in prison.
Explicit crime scene photos, obtained exclusively by 48 Hours | Mystery from sources close to the investigation and published exclusively byCrimesider show a severely beaten Flores, her body badly bruised, her clothes stained with blood.
