MANATEE COUNTY, Fla. (WFLA) — After seating a jury late Monday evening, opening statements began first thing Tuesday in the murder trial of Ashley Benefield. The 32-year-old mother and former ballerina is on trial for the shooting death of her estranged husband, 58-year-old Doug Benefield.
During opening statements, attorneys from each side shared a very different story.
Assistant State Attorney Suzanne O’Donnell detailed the couple’s love story which began in 2016. They met at a political event and got married 13 days later.
In less than a year, Ashley was pregnant with Doug’s child. The couple was also in the process of launching a dance company, a business venture that O’Donnell said was Ashley’s dream.
“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 said.
However, around the time Benefield became pregnant, O’Donnell told the jury the relationship took a turn. Benefield moved from South Carolina to Bradenton, Florida to live with her mother due to her morning sickness. From that point, she and Doug never lived together again.
“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.
The assistant state attorney said Benefield claimed her husband was poisoning her with heavy metals. She also made other complaints about non-physical domestic violence. Then, O’Donnell said the custody battle began.
“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 said to the jury.
Ashley Benefield’s defense attorney Neil Taylor shared with the jury the story of a young woman who was abused and manipulated by Doug Benefield.
“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,” Taylor said. “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.”
Taylor told the jury Doug fired a handgun into a kitchen ceiling in an attempt to get Ashley to stop talking, threw a loaded gun at her, punched their dog in the face, knocking it unconscious, and regularly carried a concealed firearm that was ‘ready to fire’.
On September 27, 2020, as Doug was helping Ashley pack up for a move to Maryland, Taylor told the jury threats and intimidation turned to violence.
“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.
The court also heard from Benefield’s next-door neighbor, John Sant, who she ran to moments after she fired multiple shots at her estranged husband.
“As soon as I opened the door, before I could say anything.. she said, ‘He attacked me,'” Sant said. “At that point, I said, ‘Who?’ She said, ‘Doug…He attacked me and I shot him,” he continued.
Sant’s 911 call was played for the jury. Throughout the call, you can hear the neighbor trying to calm Benefield. As the audio played in court, Benefield looked visibly upset.
We also heard from Doug’s cousin and his now 23-year-old daughter from a previous marriage. Both described the couple’s seemingly happy relationship while living in South Carolina.
“They were just with each other all the time. It was very lovey-dovey. They were very touchy-feely PDAs. Any event with school or extra curricular that I was in, they were together,” Eva Benefield said. “They never left each other side,” she continued.
The state is expected to call forward several more witnesses on Tuesday, including Ashley Benefield’s mother, who she was living with at the time of the shooting in 2020.
The trial is expected to last two weeks.
Benefield, if found guilty, could face a mandatory minimum sentence of 25 years to life in prison.