How a 1990 Hit-and-Run Exposed Franklin Delano Floyd's Web of Kidnapping, Abuse and Murder

On an April day in 1990, a woman named Tonya Hughes was hit by a driver who then sped off. The 20-year-old died five days later in an Oklahoma City hospital. What started as a routine criminal investigation into the driver’s identity took detectives on a whirlwind investigation that spanned decades and closed multiple kidnapping cases.

That’s because Tonya wasn’t who most people thought she was—and neither was her husband, Clarence Hughes.

The truth was that Clarence was actually Franklin Delano Floyd, a federal fugitive from Georgia who was wanted by the FBI since missing a court date after attempting to sexually assault a woman in 1973. Tonya was in reality Suzanne Marie Sevakis, who was kidnapped by Floyd as a little girl sometime between 1973 and 1975. Her true identity was not confirmed until 2014, more than 20 years after she was killed.

Floyd was briefly married to Suzanne’s mother, Sandra Chipman (now Sandra Willet), while he used the name Brandon Williams. Chipman already had four children when they married: Suzanne, Allison, Amy and Phillip.

What Chipman didn’t know is that Floyd had already served time in a Georgia prison for kidnapping and raping a 4-year-old girl.

During their marriage, Chipman was incarcerated for writing bad checks, and while serving her 30-day sentence, Floyd kidnapped all the children. He put Phillip up for adoption, dropped Allison and Amy off with a social services agency and kept the oldest, Suzanne, as his “daughter.”

Chipman eventually found Allison and Amy, but not her two other children. Phillip was adopted by a couple and didn’t learn his true identity until years later when he voluntarily gave police his DNA to be tested.

A 2022 documentary titled Girl in the Picture detailed how Floyd sexually abused and trafficked Suzanne for years. 

While in high school and using the name Sharon Marshall, Suzanne applied for colleges and was accepted to Georgia Tech with a full scholarship, but she became pregnant by a boyfriend during her senior year. She and her boyfriend fled for Alabama, but Suzanne eventually left, leaving a note that said her “father” had taken her back home with him.

Floyd forced her to give up her scholarship, and the child was put up for adoption.

They relocated to Tampa, Fla., where Suzanne worked as an exotic dancer. In 1988, she gave birth to a son, Michael Anthony Hughes, who Floyd said was his biological child. 

During the next year, she and Floyd married in New Orleans, where they lived, under the aliases Clarence Hughes and Tonya Tadlock. While living in New Orleans, Suzanne gave birth to another child, a girl later named Megan who was also put up for adoption. Michael remained in Suzanne and Floyd’s custody, and the three eventually moved to Tulsa, Okla.

In April 1990, Suzanne was found unconscious on the side of a highway outside Oklahoma City. She died five days later.

Shortly after Suzanne died, Floyd gave Michael to Oklahoma state welfare officials and disappeared. When Floyd was found and arrested two months later for the original 1973 charges, a blood test was taken and proved he was not Michael’s biological father

After Floyd was released from prison in 1993, he kidnapped now-6-year-old Michael from his elementary school on September 12, 1994. When police found Floyd in Kentucky two months later, Michael was missing, and Floyd wouldn’t say what happened to him.

Floyd was convicted of a federal kidnapping charge related to Michael’s disappearance and sent to prison again.

During that same investigation, police closed another missing person case. 

Pictures of a young woman who appeared to be bound and beaten were found taped to the gas tank of Floyd’s pickup truck. In 1996, that woman was identified as Cheryl Ann Comesso, who went missing in 1989. Her remains were found in 1995 near a freeway on-ramp in Pinellas County, Fla.

Floyd was charged with her murder, convicted and sentenced to death in 2002. 

He confessed in 2014 to fatally shooting Michael.

“Michael was being a typical 6-year-old. He was out of control, and that pushed Floyd over the edge,” FBI Special Agent Scott Lobb, who took Floyd’s confession, said. “Floyd felt the pressure and he just ran out of patience. He turned and looked at me and said, ‘I shot him twice in the back of the head to make it real quick.’”

Floyd died while awaiting execution in 2023. Michael’s remains have never been found.

After being placed for adoption, Megan was raised by Mary and Dean Joseph Dufresne. The identities of her and Michael’s biological fathers are still unknown, and the first child to whom Suzanne gave birth has never been publicly identified.

In Girl in the Picture, Megan said she wants to live up to the memory of her birth mother.

"Becoming a parent gave me even more respect for my birth mother, because she gave up two children…knowing that it was better for the kids," she said.

The hit and run that started the unraveling of Floyd's lies has never been solved. Some suspect Floyd was the driver, but he was never charged with Suzanne’s death. She is buried in Broken Arrow, Okla.