Fort Myers man arrested after kidnapping, assaulting teen

For almost 24 hours, a teenager was locked in an attic inside a garage, bound by tape. She finally escaped behind the house.

Neighbors say the man who did this to her doesn’t seem like the man they knew.

The young girl was walking along C Street in Fort Myers last week on her way to a relative’s house. A car pulled up alongside her, and that’s when the driver grabbed her by the hair and forced her to get inside.

The driver, 51-year-old Elgron Lamar Taylor, took her to his house in the Buckingham Air Park.

“It’s sad, it’s certainly not right,” said neighbor Bill Austin. “It’s something I’d hate to see anywhere, let alone in my own neighborhood.”

According to the incident report, the teenage victim told detectives that she was sexually assaulted by Taylor for the remainder of the night and into the next morning in the attic above his garage.

“It was shocking. I mean this guy has been inside my house before and so you wouldn’t think someone you’d have inside your house would have this type of drama,” said neighbor Derreck Turner.

The victim said that in the morning, Taylor put her in the trunk of his car so that he could go to work.

She told detectives she tried to escape by kicking the backseat, but he stopped her before she could get out. Once the victim was back at Taylor’s house, she was able to run to a nearby car.

“She got out of the house, ran across the yard, hopped into a stranger’s car and said…get me out of here,” Turner said.

But even after all that, Taylor got her back. He took her to a wooded area, and according to deputies, he was in the process of tying her to a tree when they arrived.

Taylor is still behind bars tonight and faces several charges, including sexual assault of a minor and kidnapping.