A former ballerina was sentenced to 20 years in prison Tuesday for the 2020 shooting death of her estranged husband in Florida.
CBS affiliate WTSP reports Ashley Benefield was sentenced to 20 years in prison, with time served, followed by 10 years of probation. The case, known as the “Black Swan Murder” trial, attracted national attention, with some comparing Benefield to the protagonist of the 2010 film “Black Swan”.
was a former ballerina pleaded guilty She was charged with murder by a jury in July for shooting and killing her husband, Doug Benefield, in September 2020 after an argument.
Ashley Benefield, 32, claimed she killed her 58-year-old estranged husband in self-defense during an argument at her mother's home, where she had moved from South Carolina after leaving him. Authorities said he shot her twice.
“I was just holding the gun in front of me and I said, wait, and he turned and he almost got into a fighting position. He started swinging his arms and hands around… He started coming towards me And he pounced on me, and I pulled the trigger,” Ashley Benefield testified at his trial,
Poole/Bradenton Herald
The couple got married after knowing each other for less than two weeks, “48 hours” reportedAt the time of their marriage, Ashley Benefield was 24 and Doug Benefield, a widower whose wife had died about nine months earlier, was 54.
As reported by “48 Hours”The marriage was rocky. There was tension between Ashley Benefield and Doug Benefield's teenage daughter, and an attempt to start a ballet company together failed. Ashley Benefield accused her husband of poisoning his first wife and left her when she was pregnant with his child and went to live with her mother and alleged that he is now poisoning her. The claims were investigated by police, and no charges were filed.
Once their child was born in 2018, Ashley Benefield reportedly kept the child away from her husband for six months until a judge intervened. After this, the pair largely reconciled and in 2020, they planned to move to Maryland together at the suggestion of Ashley Benefield.
On September 27, 2020, the Benefields were packing a U-Haul truck for relocation. Ashley Benfield's mother, Alicia Byers, took her granddaughter to a park, leaving the couple home alone. A neighbor suddenly heard screaming and called 911.
Moments later, Ashley Benefield arrived at another neighbor's house with a gun in his hand. She reportedly told the neighbor that she had shot her husband in self-defense. The neighbor called 911.
When police and emergency services responded, Doug Benefield was still alive but unable to speak. He died about an hour later at an area hospital.
Investigators determined that Doug Benefield was shot twice, once in the leg and once in the arm. That second bullet hit him in the chest. Investigators determined that the shots were fired as he was walking away from his wife.
Ashley Benefield's attorney, Faith Brown, told police at the time that her client was planning to leave her husband and had an escape plan, including finding a safe place to stay, a burner phone, and under a different name. Rental car included. Brown told police that Benefield feared her husband found out about the plan.
Ashley Benefield was arrested five weeks after the shooting.