Did Ballerina Kill Husband Because She 'Wanted to Be a Single Mother' — or Was It Self-Defense?

Ashley Benefield is on trial in a Florida court on accusations she murdered her estranged husband Doug

The trial of Ashley Benefield began earlier this week in Florida.

The 32-year-old former ballerina is accused of killing her estranged husband, 58-year-old Doug Benefield, in her mother’s Lakewood Ranch home in September 2020.

Prosecutors claim that Ashley, who has been charged with second-degree murder, killed the Navy veteran because she didn’t want him to be in her or their daughter’s life anymore.

“This case is about a woman who very early on in her pregnancy decided she wanted to be a single mother,” Assistant State Attorney Suzanne O’Donnell told the jury in opening statements in the Manatee County Judicial Center, according to The Post and Courier. “And she did not want the father of this child to have any visitation…she would stop at nothing to obtain that goal.”

Ashley's defense attorney argued that she killed Doug in self-defense after he attacked her.

“Thirty years older than Ashley, he was obsessed with her and he successfully portrayed himself as he was not in an effort to win her hand in marriage,” Neil Taylor said, per WFLA. “Despite promoting himself as a religious, honorable, and decent human being, Benefield was a manipulative, cunning, and abusive man who insisted, absolutely insisted, on control.”

The trial, which is being broadcast by Court TV, has been dubbed the "Black Swan Murder Trial," based on the 2010 film Black Swan starring Natalie Portman as an unstable ballerina.

Here’s what to know about the case.

Whirlwind Romance

Ashley was a 24-year-old ballet dancer and Doug was a 54-year-old Navy veteran and technology consultant when the two met at a Republican party fundraiser at the Palm Beach mansion of former presidential candidate Ben Carson in 2016. Sparks flew instantly and they married just 13 days later.

Ashley had a dream to start a ballet company, and with financing from Doug, the couple founded The American National Ballet, with a goal of hiring dancers of all body types, including curvier or shorter ones.

But things soon began to deteriorate.

Related: Former Ballet Dancer Charged with Fatally Shooting Estranged Husband

“All within a year of being married, they have done a vasectomy reversal, gotten pregnant, started a ballet and the ballet has crumbled,” O’Donnell, the prosecutor, said during opening statements, WFLA reported.

In August 2017, Ashley moved from South Carolina to Florida to live with her mother.

“They continued a long-distance relationship when she first moved to Florida and continued trying to keep together and communication, but about the same time as the ballet collapses, Ashley Benefield starts complaints against the victim,” O’Donnell said, per WFLA.

According to prosecutors, Ashley wanted to rid herself of Doug, and to that end, she accused him of emotional abuse and claimed he'd tried to poison her with heavy metals, Fox 13 reports. Prosecutors said she didn't notify Doug after their child was born, and that he only found out when she filed a restraining order against him.

The two battled for visitation rights before Doug was granted visitation with his daughter in July of 2018.

Related: Did a Former Ballerina Kill Her Wealthy Husband Because His Money Ran Out — Or Was It Self-Defense?

Doug's Death

On Sept. 27, 2020, Doug came by Ashley's mother's home to help Ashley pack for her and her daughter’s move to Maryland, where Doug also planned to relocate.

Soon after, police responded to a 911 call and found Doug fatally shot on a bedroom floor, bleeding in three places. Ashley told police her husband had tried to attack her and she had shot him in self-defense.

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The Manatee County Sheriff's Office at the time said that Ashley claimed Doug was attacking her during the incident, but "detectives found no evidence that she was acting in self-defense when she fired multiple shots at her husband."

"Based on entry wounds on Douglas it does not appear that he was facing Ashley when she began shooting. It also does not appear that Douglas had taken any kind of defensive or combative stance," according to an affidavit obtained by PEOPLE. "Douglas was not found to have any weapons on his person or near him."

Defense Says Doug Was 'Violent Abuser'

In opening statements, prosecutor O’Donnell argued that the custody battle was the cause of the killing.

“This is a long story with a lot of information, but you will see that this was a custody battle, that this mother was going to win at all costs and the cost was the life of Doug Benefield,” O’Donnell told the jury, according to WFLA.

Ashley ’s defense attorney Neil Taylor disputed the claims, describing Doug as a “disturbed man” who during the couple's four-year relationship, Taylor claimed, fired a handgun into the ceiling to get Ashley to stop talking, knocked a dog unconscious by punching it in the face, carried a concealed weapon and kept tabs on her by placing a tracker on her vehicle.

“The only thing that is going to have been established here beyond a reasonable doubt is that Douglas Benefield was a violent abuser, Ashley Benefield’s efforts to placate him was absolutely consistent with what abused women do, especially when a child is involved, and that Ashley’s result and resource to deadly force was justified under the circumstances,” Taylor said, per WFLA.

“He would not take no for an answer,” said Taylor, per the Post and Courier. “He stalked her. Doug Benefield viewed Ashley Benefield as his property.”

The prosecution rested its case on Thursday, July 25, after three days of testimony, per the Bradenton Herald.

Ashley Testifies Doug Hit Her: 'I Was Scared to Death'

On Friday, July 26, Ashley took the stand in her own defense, telling the jury about the day of the killing when they were packing boxes.

"He said, "I can see what you're doing. You're trying to get me to leave,'" she testified, WTSP reported. "He said, 'I don't have to leave. I can stay and spend the night if I want to because I'm your husband.'"

Ashley told the jury that after she asked her estranged husband to leave, he hit her instead, per FOX13.

"I was scared to death. I thought he was going to kill me. There was nowhere to go. I was trapped," she said, according to FOX13.

She said she then ran to her room and grabbed a gun and fired.

She told the jury that Doug was standing in the doorway. "His face was red," she said, per FOX13. "The veins were bulging in his neck. The way he was looking at me, it didn't even look like Doug. His eyes we're black."

"He started coming towards me and then he lunged at me and I started pulling the trigger," she said, per WTSP. "And he just kept coming. And I remember trying to move to get away from him, but he kept coming at me."

She said she later ran for help.

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