MEMPHIS, Tenn. — An American man admitted on Monday that he took a Memphis school teacher hostage while she was out running early in the morning and then killed her.
It was agreed that Cleotha Abston was guilty of first-degree murder and especially severe kidnapping in the death of Eliza Fletcher.
Abston, who is 40 years old, was supposed to go to court in February. If Abston was found guilty of first-degree murder, the prosecutors had said they would ask for the death sentence. After Abston admitted guilt, Judge Lee Coffee gave him a punishment of life in prison without the chance of parole.
On September 2, 2022, Fletcher was running early in the morning near the University of Memphis when she was grabbed from the street and pushed into an SUV. A few days later, her body was found near an empty apartment.
People in Memphis were shocked when 34-year-old kindergarten teacher and mother of two Fletcher was killed. They quickly came together to support her family. A week after she was taken, runners in Memphis and several other cities held early morning races in her honor. This is something that has been done every year on the anniversary of her disappearance in Memphis.
His family said in a statement that they “miss the bright light of Liza’s life every day.”
“Liza meant so much to so many, and her smile radiated happiness, energy, and comfort,” her loved ones said. “Her faith, kindness, and compassion touched many people, including her husband, her children, her parents, her brother, the rest of her family, her friends, her students, their families, her fellow teachers, the people at her church, and many more.”
Abston, who has also been known as Cleotha Henderson, was caught after cops found his DNA on sandals close to where Fletcher was last seen. The cause of Fletcher’s death was found to be a gunshot wound to the head.
Jun Ganguli, Abston’s lawyer, said, “We’ve been meeting with him regularly for a few months and telling him that we need to settle this case because we can’t go to trial and expect to win.”
A year before he was charged with Fletcher’s murder, Abston raped a woman and was given an 80-year prison term on May 17. In April, he was found guilty of raping a woman while putting a gun to her head in September 2021.
Abston has been charged with crimes since he was a minor in the 1990s. He wasn’t charged with rape until after being charged with killing Fletcher a year later. This was because the sexual assault kit took a long time to be processed. The Legislature passed a law after Fletcher’s death that requires the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to give a report every three months on how long it takes to test a sexual assault kit.
