Man pleads guilty to abducting and killing Eliza Fletcher, the Memphis teacher who was abducted during her morning jog

A Tennessee man pleaded guilty Monday to kidnapping a Memphis school teacher while she was on her morning jog and then killing her.

Cleota Abston pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and aggravated kidnapping and aggravated kidnapping and death Eliza Fletcher.

Abston, who also sometimes goes by the name Henderson, kept his head down as he spoke to the judge but did not react after pleading guilty, CBS affiliate WREG-TV reported. reported.

Abston, 40, went on trial in February. Prosecutors said they were would seek the death penalty if Abston had been convicted of first-degree murder. Instead, Judge Lee Coffey sentenced Abston to life in prison without parole after he pleaded guilty.

Fletcher was grabbed on the street as she jogged before dawn near the University of Memphis on September 2, 2022, and pushed into an SUV. Her body was found days later near an empty duplex.

The killing of Fletcher, a 34-year-old kindergarten teacher and mother of two, shocked the Memphis community and prompted an outpouring of support for her family. Runners in Memphis and several other cities held morning running competitions in her honor a week after her abduction, a tradition that continues in the city on the anniversary of her abduction.

In a statement, Fletcher’s family said they “miss the bright light of Lisa’s life every day.”

“Lisa meant so much to so many and her smile radiated happiness, energy and comfort,” her family said. “Her husband, her children, her parents, her brother, the rest of her family, her friends, her students, her school families, her fellow teachers, her church community and many others were touched by countless examples of her faith, kindness and compassion “.

Abston was arrested after police found his DNA on sandals found near where Fletcher was last seen. An autopsy report revealed that Fletcher died of a gunshot wound to the head. She also has injuries to her right leg and a fractured jaw.

“We’ve been meeting with him regularly over the last few months and telling him that we need to settle this case, that we can’t go forward with the litigation and that we hope to be successful,” said Juni Ganguly, Abston’s attorney.

On May 17, Abston was sentenced to 80 years in prison for raping a woman a year before he was charged with Fletcher’s death. In April, he was convicted of raping a woman at gunpoint in September 2021.

Abston, whose criminal history dates back to the 1990s when he was a juvenile, was not charged in the 2021 rape case, just a year after he was charged with Fletcher’s murder, due to a long delay in handling the sexual assault suit. After Fletcher’s death, the Legislature passed a law requiring the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to publish a quarterly report on the testing time of sexual assault kits.

WREG-TV reported that District Attorney Steve Mulroy also read in court a statement from the victim’s family that was directed at Abston:

“We have no idea what happened to you to turn you into someone who is so full of wanting to hurt people. Whatever it was, it doesn’t justify or explain what you did. You changed our lives forever, and nothing will ever change There’s no other word for it, even though she didn’t deserve it, she’d be the first to help it.”