The Memphis man arrested in connection with the abduction of a kindergarten teacher and heiress to a billion-dollar hardware fortune served 20 years in prison for a kidnapping charge and was described by one neighbor as a “weird pervert.”
MISSING HEIRESS: Judge sets bond for man suspected of abducting Eliza Fletcher as desperate search continues https://t.co/djPlGOzoDc
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Cleotha Abston, 38, was charged Saturday in the kidnapping of Eliza Fletcher, a married mother of two whose abduction as she was jogging early Friday was caught on video. Fletcher, 34, is the granddaughter of Joseph Orgill III, founder of a multi-billion dollar hardware wholesaler. She has not been found despite an investigation that includes local police, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, and the FBI.
Memphis police department
Abston’s DNA was reportedly found on a pair of shoes known as “slides” left at the crime scene, near the University of Memphis. His GMC Terrain also matched the vehicle seen in surveillance video, and Abston was seen cleaning the interior of the vehicle and washing his clothes in a sink shortly after Fletcher’s abduction, according to witnesses, one of whom is Abston’s brother.
A neighbor of Abston’s told The Daily Mail that Abston once asked her for sex and also propositioned other women in the apartment complex in which he lived.
“When women were around, he would sit in the truck and stare,” she said. “He was a weird pervert. He watched me come on the porch, then came up the stairs behind me and said, ‘I will give you $100 to f***.”
“Do you think I’m a h** that needs your money?” she recalled saying, adding, “He approached at least two other girls here with the same line, offering money for sex.”
On May 25, 2000, Abston kidnapped Kemper Durand, robbed him and forced him into the trunk of his car. After hours passed, he took him to an ATM, but Durand alerted a housing authority officer, prompting Abston to flee.
Abston is being held on $500,000 bond. Fletcher has brown hair and green eyes and is 5 feet, 6 inches tall and weighs 137 pounds. She was last seen wearing a pink athletic top and purple running shorts.