ORANJESTAD, Aruba - Authorities released two former hotel security guards detained after Natalee Holloway went missing but continued to hold three younger men who took the Alabama teen to a beach before she disappeared.

Officials who confirmed Monday's release of Antonius "Mickey" John, 30, and Abraham Jones, 28, did not offer any clues to solving the mystery of Holloway's disappearance on the Dutch Caribbean island during a student trip.

The release came the day after the teen's mother, Betty Holloway Twitty, told The Associated Press that she believed the security guards were innocent but that the three young men knew what happened and should be pressed to tell the truth.

"These guys had nothing to do with this case and this decision reflects that," John's lawyer Noraina Pietersz said. The freeing of John and Jones came before a judge reviewed a motion for the release filed Monday, Pietersz added.

No one has been charged, and lawyers for the three detainees and two men just released all say their clients are innocent

"I'm very happy but also disappointed," John said by telephone of his detention since June 5. "I knew from day one that I was innocent."

Holloway vanished early May 30, hours before she was expected at the airport to return home after a five-day trip to this island with 124 classmates and seven chaperones celebrating their graduation from Mountain Brook, Ala., High School. Her U.S. passport and packed bags were found in her hotel room.

Holloway Twitty said if she does not see results soon, she might start to believe authorities are trying to protect the young men, who told police they took the 18-year-old Holloway to a beach after an evening of dancing and drinking, hours before she disappeared.

The security guards were detained after the young men said they dropped her off and last saw her around 2 a.m. being approached in the car park of her hotel by a black man in a security guard uniform.

Those remaining in custody include a 17-year-old Dutch honors student at Aruba International School who is the son of a high-ranking judicial official in Aruba and whose detained friends told police he was kissing and fondling the girl in the back of the car when they went to the beach.

Aruba's Prime Minister Nelson Oduber has stressed that no one is above the law on the Dutch Caribbean island governed by a local parliament. The Netherlands Antilles is responsible for foreign and defense affairs.

"All three of those boys know what happened to her," Holloway Twitty said on Sunday. "They all know what they did with her that night."

Attorney General Caren Janssen confirmed she had ordered the release of the two guards but declined to say why.

"The investigation is ongoing," she told the AP.

Government spokesman Ruben Trapenberg said the release "probably means they had nothing to do with this case and prosecutors were able to check out their alibis."

He said it showed investigators were working around the clock to solve the case despite any perception that they were getting nowhere after two weeks without explaining the mystery of the teenager's disappearance.

"Even though we don't hear every detail of the investigation, they (investigators) are hard at work to solve this," he said.

Hundreds of islanders and tourists have volunteered in daily searches for Holloway, whose plight has shocked residents in one of the safest destinations in the region. One murder and six rapes were recorded last year on the island of 97,000 people. This year there have been two murders and three rapes.