Ex-FBI agent says Eliza Fletcher suspect’s previous victim worked at same law firm as her UNCLE

A former FBI investigator said Eliza Fletcher’s kidnapping suspect had previously abducted a former co-worker of the heiress’s uncle. 

Jennifer Coffindaffer revealed that Cleotha Abston’s first kidnapping victim, Memphis Attorney Kemper Durand, worked in the same flaw firm as Fletcher’s uncle, Michael Keeney, NewsNation reports. 

‘I think this is a very significant clue, and I’m sure certainly that the FBI, the US Marshalls and the TBI is looking closely at this relationship,’ Coffindaffer said.    

Abston, 38, was only 16-years-old when he and an accomplice kidnapped Durand, threw him into his own trunk, and tried to force him to withdraw money at a gas station ATM in 2000. 

Abston spent 22 years in jail for the crime, and two years later after his early release in 2020, he is back in custody for the suspected kidnapping and murder of Fletcher.  

Cleotha Abston, 38, the suspect for the kidnapping and murder of Eliza Fletcher, had served 20 years in jail for kidnapping one of her uncle’s former co-workers  

Eliza Fletcher (left), 34, was kidnapped after being forced into a black SUV on Friday, triggering a four-day search. It came 22 years after Memphis Attorney Kemper Durand (right) was kidnapped and thrown into the trunk of his own car by Abston and an accomplice

Durand was an attorney at the Lewis Thomason law firm, where Fletcher’s uncle, Michael Keeney (above) currently works 

In his victim impact statement, Durand, who died in 2013, said he feared for his life during his kidnapping, where he was rescued by a nearby Memphis Housing Authority guard who heard his scream for help, the Commercial Appeal reported. 

‘It is quite likely that I would have been killed had I not escaped,’ Durand wrote. 

According to Durand’s impact statement, the lawyer was alarmed by the teenager’s lengthy rap sheet that began when he was just 12, which included charges of theft, aggravated assault, and rape. 

Durand was sentenced to 24 years in prison but was released early in 2020 according to the Tennessee Department of Corrections. 

Coffindaffer condemned the decision to release Abston two-years early, saying that keeping him in prison would have prevented the alleged crime. 

‘Any time someone is let out early and the goes on to commit another violent crime, yes, I think society’s let down,’ she said. ‘I think we are all let down by his early release.

Abston did not speak during the short 15 minute hearing, and was led away by officers with his hands cuffed behind his back. He confirmed in an affidavit that he was unable to afford bond or legal representation 

Abeston was seen swaying from side to side in court as he was brought in, and turned around to look at those attending court for his hearing

Police sniffer dogs from the Shelby County Sheriff’s office working alongside search teams around a dumpster close to Mario Abston’s home. The dumpster was later hauled away by police, but it is not clear if this is the dumpster Eliza’s body was found in

Suspect Cleotha Abston, pictured here shortly after his release from prison in 2020, is being held on a $500,000 bond in relation to kidnapping charges

Authorities have charged Abston with the first degree murder and first degree murder in the perpetration of kidnapping of missing mother-of-two Fletcher, whose body was found in an abandoned elementary school.

Authorities have not yet confirmed Fletcher’s cause of death, but they have identified the body as the billionaire heiress, which was found seven miles from where she was last seen.

The Ultra-runner vanished while out for a jog around 4.30am on Friday, sparking a four-day long hunt, which led officers to several wooded areas across Memphis. 

The area where the body was found is just a hundred yards from the Longview Gardens apartment complex – where Abston’s brother, Mario, lives.

A van believed to belong to the medical examiners unit left the scene six hours after the remains were found, and is thought to have been transporting the body. 

Fletcher was last seen about 4.20am on Friday, when she was jogging (right) in Memphis and a man approached her and forced her into an SUV after a brief struggle, police said

Missing mother Eliza Fletcher pictured with her husband Richie and their two children

A map illustrating the scale of the citywide search for Eliza Fletcher in Memphis 

Members of the Memphis Police Department’s Auto Theft Task Force shown at the site of the search, which is just seven miles from where Eliza was reported missing

Photos from the scene showed a police helicopter circling above the search. Horrified neighbors gathered around the crime scene as the gruesome discovery was made. 

‘It’s emotional, it really hurts,’ April Jackson, 30, told DailyMail.com at 7.30pm, with the body yet to be removed.

‘That could have been anybody out jogging that morning, a student, anyone. And he was just released two years ago for another abduction and he gets out and does it again,’ she said. 

‘It makes me sick.’ She was out yesterday offering to aid the search, when police and a bloodhound were out in the area, within a couple hundred yards of the body. 

In the criminal complaint against Cleotha, witnesses were quoted as saying they saw the suspect at his brother’s home behaving strangely and washing the carpet of this 2013 GMC Terrain. 

The violent felon, accused of snatching billionaire heiress Eliza, had stalked the area she went missing from while jogging for almost 30 minutes before her abduction.

On Sunday, a neighbor of Mario Abston’s told DailyMail.com exclusively that she had seen the suspect at his brother’s house nearly every day for the last month.

Authorities arrested Cleotha Abston, 38, before charging him with especially aggravated kidnapping and tampering with evidence following Fletcher’s disappearance on September 2.

Officers have footage of the vehicle used in the kidnapping in the same area 24 minutes before the mother-of-two was taken at 4:20am in Memphis, Tennessee. 

Surveillance footage obtained by police, which has not been released, show a man running ‘aggressively’ towards Fletcher and forcing her into the passenger side of the vehicle.

The pair struggled, and the car then sat in the parking lot for four minutes with Fletcher inside before driving off to an unknown location.

After the discovery of the car, Fletcher’s family, her father, Beasley, mother, Adele, brother Gill and her husband appeared on camera alongside their lawyer, Mike Keeney

The scene showing the search for Fletcher just prior to the announcement of the grisly discovery on Monday evening, which has now been confirmed as the missing jogger

Abston also had new charges filed against him that include identity theft, theft of property and fraudulent use/illegal possession of credit/debit card of $1000 or less.

Fletcher is the granddaughter of hardware magnate Joseph ‘Joe’ Orgill III who died in 2018. 

Fletcher’s mother, Adele, is Orgill’s daughter. Their hardware wholesale family business, Orgill Inc., does $3 billion in annual sales, according to the company’s website.

The description of the company on the website calls Orgill ‘the world’s largest independent hardline distributor with annual sales of $3 billion.’ The company is privately owned.

 More than 5,500 people are employed by the company.