Stanley Szeliga Fort Worth Texas strip club customer shoots Abigail Saldana exotic dancer dead after harassing and stalking woman and posting he had paid her thousands of dollars.
A Texas man who regularly visited a Fort Worth strip club allegedly shot dead an exotic dancer after repeatedly stalking and threatening the woman according to reports.
Stanley Szeliga, 54, is accused of fatally shooting Abigail Saldana, an exotic dancer at Rick’s Cabaret, last week while behind the wheel of a vehicle not far from the club where she regularly worked.
‘I don’t know where she was going that night,’ Saldaña’s mom, Jessica Contreras, told the Star-Telegram last week of her 22 year old daughter. ‘We got a text about 6:30 p.m. that night, and the shooting happened about two hours later.’
At roughly 9 p.m. on Oct. 26, a witness reported seeing a vehicle veer off an exit ramp onto a grassy area near Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, police said. The caller described seeing bullet holes in the car’s passenger side and a person inside who wasn’t moving. Responding officers and emergency personnel pronounced Saldana dead. Three shell casings and broken glass were found not far from Saldaña’s car.
According to an arrest warrant affidavit, Szeliga had posted on Instagram about making payments to Saldana at times for $800, $200, and $1,000.
‘Envisioned a future’
Three hours before Saldana’s murder, Szeliga posted that he paid Saldana $3,000. Szeliga threatened in the post to report her for alleged prostitution, detectives said.
In one Instagram post on Szeliga’s page, he claimed that he ‘envisioned a future,’ with Saldana but insisted that she had been lying to him and that he was a victim after accusing her of working as a prostitute.
‘I never thought I’d be one of those guys taken advantage of. Sharing for awareness. Abigail S. and I, since July 2021, we have been enjoying each other’s company,’ Szeliga wrote. ‘She’s so beautiful and personable that I envisioned a future with her. But dealing with all the lies is overwhelming, I realize that’s part of your primary job as an adult entertainer.’
Added Szeliga: ‘If you only leave your second job, being in a high-end prostitution ring we could move forward. Yes, this pays $2000 per session, but it’s illegal. And having a boyfriend whilst having sex with other men?!’
A cabaret manager told investigators that the exotic dancer had expressed concern about a patron named Stan, a former military veteran, who Saldana complained of harassing her.
The manager told police Saldana ‘was frightened of Stan because he was stalking and harassing her,’ and provided them video Saldana posted two weeks earlier to her Instagram about finding a tracking device under her car according to an arrest warrant.
Footage obtained from a traffic camera near Saldana’s apartment showed Szeliga’s red pick-up tailing Saldana’s car. The man’s vehicle was seen passing the same spot near Saldana’s home at least five other times before she was shot, which were indications of stalking.
‘He took her away from me’
Szeliga was arrested after a SWAT team found him on a balcony in his apartment with wounds on his face and neck that appeared to be self-inflicted.
After being treated at a local hospital, Szeliga was charged in connection with Saldana’s death on Thursday and is being held in the Tarrant County Jail with bond set at $250,000.
‘He took her away from me, and I’m gonna make sure every time he has a court date, he will see my face there,’ Contreras told WFAA, adding that her daughter was a hardworking and courageous mom. ‘He’s gonna see that Abby was never alone.’
Szeliga reportedly has a prior criminal record in California, which includes charges related to domestic violence.
