Eliza Fletcher suspect is a ‘creep’ who tried to pay for sex, neighbors say
The convicted kidnapper charged with snatching Tennessee teacher and hardware heiress Eliza Fletcher was a “creep” and “pervert” who constantly tried to pay women for sex, according to neighbors.
Cleotha Abston, 38, is being held on a $500,000 bond on charges of tampering with evidence and especially aggravated kidnapping of Fletcher, a mom who remained missing Monday.
The suspect had long been considered by neighbors to be a disturbing figure while staying with his brother — a convicted felon who was also arrested on connected drug charges — at a Memphis housing complex swamped over the weekend by officers who were seen taking away a large dumpster.
“He gave me creepy vibes — he would look at you some type of way,” one female neighbor told WREG.
One neighbor also told DailyMail.com that Abston would “sit in the truck and stare” at women — and offer them money for sex.
“He was a weird pervert,” said the neighbor, only giving the name April.
“He watched me come on the porch, then came up the stairs behind me and said, ‘I will give you $100 to f–k,'” the woman told the outlet.
When she asked if he thought she was a “hoe that needs your money,” he reportedly replied, “It ain’t like that … I just want to have some fun.”
Another neighbor, Latoya, 35, told the same outlet that Abston also propositioned her and her 20-year-old niece earlier this year.
“He kept waving me over to him and was like, ‘I’ve got $100,'” Latoya told DailyMail.com.
“As far as I know, nobody here have sex with him,” she said.
“He creepy, he really creepy,” she told the Mail.
Abston — who dubbed himself a “wild child” on social media — had only been out two years from prison, where he was serving time for being charged with violently kidnapping an attorney.
He was just 16 when he forced local attorney Kemper Durand into the trunk of a car — only fleeing after the lawyer yelled for help while withdrawing cash from an ATM, reports noted at the time.
Abston was charged Sunday with snatching Fletcher — who comes from a pedigreed Tennessee family that founded a $3.2 billion private hardware company — and forcing her into a black SUV in a “violent” manner while she jogged in the early hours Friday.
He was linked by DNA tests to a pair of Champion slides left at the scene, and his cellphone put him at the scene of Friday’s abduction, police said.
Tennessee authorities obtained surveillance footage of the kidnapping, which allegedly showed Abston running “aggressively toward the victim, and then force the victim Eliza Fletcher into the passenger’s side of the vehicle,” court documents said.
“During the abduction, there appeared to be a struggle,” according to the affidavit, which cited “noticeable damage to the back-passenger taillight area” of the GMC Terrain.
“As the abduction was violent with, as captured on video, the suspect waiting for, then rushing towards the victim, then forcing the victim into the car, where she was confined and removed and continues to be missing, it is believed and supported by the facts and physical evidence that she suffered serious injury,” the affidavit said.
Abston has refused to cooperate with investigators, police said.
An arraignment has been set for Tuesday. Online court records do not show if Abston has a lawyer who can comment on his behalf.
His 36-year-old brother, Mario Abston, was also charged Sunday with
possession with intent to manufacture and sell both fentanyl and heroin, as well as possession of a firearm during the commission of a dangerous felony.
He is “currently not believed to be connected to Fletcher’s abduction,” police stressed.
A wannabe rapper under the name Yola Bizza, the younger brother had lost his wife, Nakita Dixon, 31, to a drug overdose in March last year, according to his social media as well as neighbors.
He was in bed with his wife when she died, and “Mario’s definitely going through something himself,” neighbor April told the Mail.
