Ashley Benefield’s step-daughter Eva appears elated as jury in Black Swan murder trial finds killer ballerina guilty

The daughter of a man shot dead by his estranged wife celebrated the news Tuesday that her former stepmother has been found guilty of manslaughter.

Ashley Benefield was sentenced after seven hours of jury deliberations in Florida on Tuesday, Fox 13 reports.

The 32-year-old former dancer, whose case became known as the “Black Swan murder trial,” was charged with second-degree murder in connection with the September 2020 shooting death of her estranged husband, Doug Benefield, 59.

However, the jury found that she acted in self-defense when she fired the gun at her mother’s Lakewood Ranch home, contradicting the prosecution’s claim that the shooting was premeditated.

Still, Eva Benefield, Doug’s 23-year-old daughter from a previous marriage, seemed delighted with the verdict.

“After four years of waiting, my father got the justice he deserved,” she said in a TikTok video after the verdict.

She added that she has much more to say about the weeks-long process once she has collected her thoughts.

When the verdict was read in court on Tuesday, Ashley showed no emotion before she was taken away.

The judge hearing her case revoked her $100,000 bail and placed her back in the custody of the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office.

She now faces a maximum prison sentence of 15 years in Florida, but if she had been convicted of second-degree murder, she could have faced 25 years to life.

A hearing on the ruling will be held at a later date.

Eva previously testified that in the early days of their relationship, her father and Ashley were “just together all the time.”

“They were lovely, always in public. They never left each other’s side,” she said.

The two met in August 2016 at Ben Carson’s home in Palm Beach, Florida, while she was campaigning for then-Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

Just 13 days later they got married.

Within a year of their marriage, Doug, a retired Navy officer, helped Ashley realize her dream of starting a ballet company, using his own money and contacts.

He served as the company’s CEO, while Ashley took on the role of executive director.

However, shortly after the company was founded, it was sued by dancers and choreographers, claiming breach of contract because they were fired just weeks after being hired.

Doug also reversed his vasectomy and Ashley became pregnant three months later.

Then everything changed, Assistant District Attorney Suzanne O’Donnell argued in court.

She said Ashley moved to Bradenton from South Carolina to live with her mother because she started having morning sickness, and she never lived with Doug again after that.

‘They continued a long-distance relationship when she first moved to Florida and continued to try to stay together and communicate, but around the same time as the ballet [company] “As the man collapses, Ashley Benefield begins to complain to the victim,” O’Donnell told the jury.

She began accusing Doug of poisoning her and committing non-physical domestic violence against her.

But detectives with the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office conducted a five-week investigation and could find no evidence to support her claims of abuse.

Prosecutors attempted to paint the picture that Ashley killed Doug in a last-ditch effort to gain custody of their daughter, who was 2 years old at the time of the shooting.

“This is a case about a woman who decided early in her pregnancy that she wanted to be a single mother,” O’Donnell argued in her opening statement. “She did not want the father of this child to have any contact with her.

“This is a long story. This was a custody battle that the mother was going to win at all costs, and the prize was Doug Benefield’s life.”

However, defense attorneys argued that Doug abused Ashley.

Neil Taylor told the jury he had once fired a gun into the kitchen ceiling to stop Ashley from talking, thrown a loaded gun at her, punched their dog in the face, knocking it unconscious, and regularly carried a firearm “ready to fire.”

He also claimed that after Ashley and Doug separated, he followed her illegally, often without her permission and sometimes even driving from out of state to keep an eye on her.

Doug is said to have stood in the neighbor’s backyard in the middle of the night at least once to see her.

The couple even obtained a court order in South Carolina in 2017 that prohibited them from having contact with each other.

After Doug appeared to violate the restraining order, Taylor said Ashley filed a domestic violence injunction in Florida, preventing him from seeing their daughter.

However, the order was dismissed when a judge said she did not find Ashley’s allegations of abuse credible.

On the night of the shooting, defense attorneys argued that Doug had shown up unannounced at Ashley’s mother’s Florida home.

In court documents, they alleged that upon arrival he was “cheerful, excited and lively” but eventually became “agitated, sullen and intimidating.”

After verbally abusing his wife, Doug allegedly hit her with a moving box, causing abrasions, the defense alleged.

“Doug Benefield knew full well that day that this relationship was over,” Taylor argued in court.

He further alleged that Doug was manipulative and “considered Ashley Benefield his property.”

“Despite promoting himself as a religious, honorable and decent man, Benefield was a manipulative, cunning and abusive man who absolutely wanted to be in control,” Taylor added.

After the shooting, Ashley ran to her neighbor’s house in Bradenton.

“I heard a really loud banging on my door,” neighbor Josh Sant testified last week, as Ashley faces charges of murder in the veteran’s death. according to Fox 13. ‘It did surprise me.’

He said he opened the door and found Ashley. She told him that her husband had attacked her and that she had shot him.

Sant then called 911 and told officers, “She just walked by, her ex-husband attacked her and she said she shot him,” according to an audio recording played in court.

During the phone call, jurors could hear Sant trying to calm Benefield down, WFLA reported.

As the audio played in the courtroom, Ashley could be seen crying.