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Re: Lancaster PA couples photo from Aruba shows skeleton
http://articles.lancasteronline.com/local/4/249987
Patti Muldowney was busy snapping pictures of colorful fish during her snorkeling dive off the coast of Aruba last fall. She didn't notice what else was on the sea floor.
"We only discovered it after we got the film developed," the 62-year-old Rapho Township woman said.
Flipping through the prints in December, the Muldowneys realized Patti had photographed more than just underwater scenery.
One picture appears to show a human skeleton.
"You can see a fish. You can see some rocks. And then you can see this body lying on its back, facing up," said her husband, John Muldowney.
They showed friends. They showed the local police.
All agreed: It looks like human bones.
"I showed my doctor," John Muldowney said. "He said it looks like it's weighted down with some rocks."
Skeleton. Aruba. Could it be? The Muldowneys wonder.
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The Muldowneys forwarded copies of the photo '” which they had enlarged '” to the FBI field office in Philadelphia, but investigators won't say what, if anything, they're doing with it.
John Muldowney has a gut feeling the skeleton could be that of Natalee Holloway, the 18-year-old Alabama honors student whose mysterious disappearance in Aruba in May 2005 continues to make international headlines.
"It just seems so strange that that girl never showed up, and here we are right off the shoreline, right where she disappeared, and there's a body lying there," said John Muldowney, 78, a retired propane inspector with the state Department of Labor and Industry and owner of the Pinch Pond Family Campground.
"I hate to say I wish it was her, but it would give that family some closure."
Muldowney said he contacted this newspaper about the photo because he was getting nowhere with the FBI.
"I've called Quantico" '” the agency's training academy in Virginia '” "so much the receptionist said, 'We've got to stop meeting like this,' " he said.
The FBI in Philadelphia sent the picture to its senior investigators who work in the Caribbean.
"We did receive that photo, and it was sent to the lead agent down in Miami who handles that area in the Caribbean," said Special Agent Frank Burton Jr., a spokesman for the FBI's field office in Philadelphia.
It is unclear what happened to the photo after that. The FBI in Miami said it has no record of getting it, and neither does the agency's legal attaché in Barbados, which has jurisdiction over Aruba.
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Holloway was last seen on May 30, 2005, during her high school's graduation trip to the Dutch Caribbean island. Her classmates reported seeing her leave the Carlos 'n Charlie's in the capital city of Oranjestad.
The case remains unsolved, though a man once suspected of involvement in Holloway's disappearance has recently claimed to have disposed of her body.
Joran van der Sloot, 22, said in an interview with RTL Nieuws that Holloway accidentally fell from a balcony and he disposed of her body in a swamp. He previously told an undercover reporter that she died unexpectedly while they were kissing and he dumped her body in the ocean.
Aruban prosecutors say they lack evidence to charge Van der Sloot.
Holloway's family has offered a reward of $250,000 for help solving her disappearance. It has also offered a $1 million reward for information leading to her safe return.
Since her disappearance nearly five years ago, tourists have reported finding skeletal remains on the island. Tests have shown them be those of shipwrecked sailors, however.
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The Muldowneys were on a seven-day cruise aboard Royal Caribbean's Adventure Of The Seas, whose first port was Oranjestad.
They and another couple from Lititz had taken a catamaran out to a snorkeling site. "It was far enough out that we couldn't see land," remembers family friend Ken Dimm.
The couples remember the site was near a shipwreck, though which one of the numerous wrecks off the western coast of Aruba is unclear. The most popular snorkeling and scuba site there is near the Antilla, a German freighter that was scuttled in World War II.
Patti Muldowney went snorkeling with the Dimms while her husband stayed above on a catamaran. She had purchased a disposable camera and was taking pictures from just under the water's surface.
"It was kind of hard, my first time taking pictures. You can see a little bit of the wreckage, so I saw it down there and snapped it," said Patti Muldowney, who works in the billing department at Luther Acres.
Only two months later, in December, did she realize there was more to that picture.
Evette Dimm noticed it first.
"She looks at the one picture, and you can see a fish in it," remembers John Muldowney. "Then she says, 'God, that looks like a skeleton or a corpse.' "
Patti Muldowney wonders whether the skeleton is that of Holloway.
"The thing is, they haven't found her yet," she said. "So, for the parents' sake, I would hope that this picture does help.
"But we have not heard anything. I hope they do look into it. It would be good if the parents have finality."
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Not sure if this is a hoax, or if it will be Nataless Halloway, but I think it'd give closure to her family if it was. Just gives a scenario of how it all happened. Always knew that Dutch guy was guilty, you can just tell.
Re: Lancaster PA couples photo from Aruba shows skeleton
I dunno. Looking at the photos, it seems like a stretch to me. These people are seeing what they want to see in a random clump of rocks. Amazing thing how the human brain can create recognizable images out of randomness. Instead of the shadow of a tree and a stump, people see Bigfoot hunched over. Happens all the time.
Re: Lancaster PA couples photo from Aruba shows skeleton
On second look I see what your saying DL. But are you looking at the closeup picture, the skull rock & jawbone do look eerily similar to that of human remains. Although, true, it also can look like a few rocks too. Interesting.
