SARASOTA, Fla. – A former ballerina was sentenced Tuesday to 20 years in prison for the death of her estranged husband at his Florida home on the 20th.
The verdict came four months after a six-judge jury found Ashley Benefield, 32, guilty of murder. Benefield was initially charged with second-degree murder but the jury decided on a lesser charge of murder after seven hours of deliberation.
While Manatee County District Court Judge Matt Whyte said he believed Benefield was under extreme pressure and showed remorse for the Sept. 27, 2020, did not give him a reduced sentence. His lawyer Neil Taylor said the sentence would be appealed.
Taylor said her client acted in self-defense when he fatally shot her estranged husband, Doug Benefield, 58, following a four-year-long violent and abusive relationship. The shooting happened during an argument at Ashley Benefield’s home in Lakewood Ranch, a planned community northeast of Sarasota, Florida.
A probable cause affidavit states that a neighbor called police when Ashley Benefield, who appeared distressed, pounded on her door shortly after the shooting while holding a gun.
Ashley Benefield showed no emotion during Tuesday’s sentencing. As Whyte announced his sentence, a comforting hand wrapped around Eva Benefield, Doug’s eldest daughter from a previous marriage, as she sat on the left side of the house surrounded by her family and her father’s supporters.
Whyte also sentenced the former ballerina to 10 years of probation after her time in prison. Within 60 days of her initial evaluation, Ashley Benefield will need to undergo a mental health evaluation and complete any recommended treatment. Whyte ordered that Ashley Benefield must also dispose of the gun used in the shooting.
“I think both sides have … talked about the lens and the perspective,” Whyte said. “And I think this is a good example of how, whatever lens you view this issue from can affect how you view the actors, the outcome, the participants, and the outcome.”
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Relationships are difficult
Ashley and Doug Benefield met in 2016 and married 13 days later following a whirlwind romance. He was 24 and she was 54, according to news reports at the time.
In the early years of their marriage, the couple started the American National Ballet but the company collapsed before it got off the ground, according to testimony during the trial. Ashley Benefield is a graduate of the Maryland Youth Ballet.
Throughout their marriage, the couple experienced a turbulent relationship that included domestic abuse against Doug Benefield, marriage counseling, and court cases in South Carolina and Florida – where Ashley Benefield had moved to live with her mother after becoming pregnant in 2017.
Ashley Benefield had argued that the case should be thrown out based on Florida’s “Stand your ground” law. In her petition for the case to be dismissed, she said her husband was abusive and crazy, always carried a loaded weapon and once fired a shot on the roof of their kitchen to threaten her.
What caused the 2020 shooting?
On the afternoon of Sept. 27, 2020, Doug Benefield arrived at the Lakewood Ranch home with a U-Haul truck to help pack for Maryland. It seemed that Doug Benefield was under the impression that he, his wife, and daughter would travel together, even though they would live separately, according to court documents and past testimony.
Taylor told jurors that tensions mounted as the pair packed up and became more and more confrontational. Despite Ashley Benefield’s efforts to slow it down, court documents say Doug Benefield became physical – physically assaulting Ashley Benefield with a box, blocking her from leaving the room, and following her into her bedroom where he held a gun.
When Doug Benefield allegedly approached her, Ashley Benefield fired a shot, according to court documents.
Witnesses outside the home told investigators they heard about six gunshots and about 30 seconds later, they saw Ashley Benefield running out of the house toward a neighbor’s house with a gun in her hand, screaming and crying.
The family tries to check the comments on the good behavior of Doug Benefield
Outside the Manatee County Judicial Center, Tommie and Eva Benefield stopped to talk to reporters.
“The verdict means we know what it’s going to do to him, in the end, as opposed to what it’s costing his daughter, Ashley and Doug’s daughter, (and) what it’s costing Eva every day of her life,” said Tommie Benefield, Doug Benefield’s grandson. .
He added that the sentence was a positive step in seeing Ashley Benefield pay the price. Tommie Benefield said his family and the prosecutor will fight hard during the appeal to keep Ashley Benefield in prison as they believe she is a flight risk.
Tears welled up in Eva Benefield’s eyes as she stood before the court. Two red hearts stood out against his dark green suit jacket – one stitched to the left below his heart, the second stitched to his back on the right.
The heart said it was a sign of where my father had been shot.
Earlier in the courtroom, Eva Benefield recalled her memories of her loving father: the two of them eating dinner on Valentine’s Day, the good morning texts with Bible verses she would wake up from her father, his efforts to attend all his extracurricular activities. and his driving an hour out of his way to drop off coffee for him and his friends.
Her father always called or texted, Eva Benefield said, and she always answered the phone when he called, especially after her mother’s death. He knew how worried Eva would be if she didn’t pick up.
“I watched my father paint over every memory and every corner of that house, he changed the furniture, removed all my mother’s house that was left for you to enjoy life without the remains of my father’s dead wife and her soul,” Eva. Benefield said. “I had to come home from school to see you naked, I was sitting on the countertops where my mother always cooked dinner for our family. I had to live in a room that was stripped of the memories I still hold on to so that I can remember the happy childhood that was there. My parents gave it to me.”
Doug Benefield’s brother, Wes Benefield, apologized to Ashley Benefield, adding that he did not hate her.
The defense moves to the ground
Taylor sought for his client to be granted a stay in his trial, but Whyte refused. Taylor had urged Whyte to look into the reception of Doug Benefield in the department which confirmed the history of domestic violence, and the letter Ashley Benefield had left three years earlier for her husband when she left him for Florida.
While Whyte said that Taylor had shown that Doug Benefield was a founder, willing to participate, riot, or provoke action, he did not see that the departure was necessary.
The only witness that Taylor called on Tuesday to testify before the court was Dr. Barbara Russell, a social worker and mental health specialist, who evaluated both Doug and Ashley Benefield before they were shot.
Russell told the judge that Ashley Benefield has a problem with post-traumatic stress caused by severe trauma, the reason being “a bad relationship with Douglas Benefield, from the time the abuse started in their marriage to the incident of the attack. which led to the shooting on Sept. 27.”
Assistant State’s Attorney Suzanne O’Donnell, the lead prosecutor in the case, told Russell that Ashley Benefield had also been diagnosed with histrionic personality disorder, a mental disorder that causes people to act in strange and emotional ways to get attention.
Russell said he was aware of “false diagnoses” and explained that women who have been abused by intimate partners are often misdiagnosed, especially if the person diagnosing them does not have a full understanding of the full picture.
Sharing: Thao Nguyen and Anthony Robledo, USA TODAY
Gabriela Szymanowska covers legal affairs for the Herald-Tribune in association with Report for America. You can support his work with a tax-deductible donation to Report for America. Contact Gabriela Szymanowska at gszymanowska@gannett.com, or at X: @GabrielaSzyman3.
This article originally appeared on the Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Former ballerina sentenced to 20 years in death of estranged husband.