Curacao police say leads in the case of a missing US diplomat are going cold

Curacao: Case of missing US diplomat going cold

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Curacao detectives are still trying to solve the disappearance of a U.S. diplomat whose bloodied clothes were found nearly three months ago on a rocky beach, a police official said Sunday.

Police spokesman Alfred Suarez says the missing-person case remains open. But he says that there have been no new leads since police broadcast a video in October asking islanders for more information on the last known whereabouts of U.S. Vice Consul James Hogan.

The 49-year-old American official vanished Sept. 24 after leaving his Curacao home for one of his regular late-night walks.

Police said a trail of Hogan’s blood was found on rocks leading to the water at Baya Beach, where his clothes were folded neatly. An expensive kitchen knife and Hogan’s cell phone were found in the water just off the beach.

Curacao investigators have said they are considering all possibilities, including suicide.

In the days after Hogan’s disappearance, the local coast guard and the U.S. Navy scoured the shoreline. Newspapers published missing-person fliers with Hogan’s photo.

U.S. State Department spokesman Darby Holladay declined to comment Sunday.

Hogan, a Florida resident, arrived in Curacao in August 2008 for a two-year assignment. The Dutch island off the coast of Venezuela is the seat of the Netherlands Antilles government.