FBI paid $15K to Joran van der Sloot in sting

Joran Van der Sloot, top, is escorted by police officers outside a Peruvian police station, near the border with Chile in Tacna, Peru, Friday, June 4, 2010.

WASHINGTON — Two federal law enforcement officials say U.S. authorities paid Joran van der Sloot $15,000 in a sting operation and delayed arresting him because they were trying to help build a murder case against him in the 5-year-old unsolved slaying of Natalee Holloway in Aruba.

During that delay, Van der Sloot arrived in Lima, Peru, on May 14 from Colombia and authorities say he has confessed to last week's killing of a 21-year-old business student in his hotel room there.

The law enforcement officials say the investigation into Holloway's unsolved murder was revived about six weeks ago when van der Sloot reached out to an individual close to Holloway's mother in Alabama and requested $250,000 in exchange for disclosing the burial site of Holloway's body on the island of Aruba.