On Tuesday, a former ballerina who was found guilty of manslaughter for killing her estranged husband in self-defense received a 20-year prison sentence.
When Ashley Benefield, 33, shot and killed Doug Benefield, 58, in her Florida home on September 27, 2020, she faced a potential penalty of 30 years in jail.
According to Tampa’s NBC affiliate WFLA, Benefield received a 20-year jail sentence and a 10-year probationary period.
She was accused of second-degree murder by prosecutors in the 12th Judicial District of Florida, which is located south of Tampa. After a six-day trial last summer, a jury found her guilty of the lesser charge of first-degree manslaughter but acquitted her.
She characterized her spouse as violent, domineering, and abusive in her trial testimony. After an argument at home turned into a physical struggle that she said made her fear for her life, she testified that she shot him to death.
The physical evidence from the gunshot did not support Benefield’s version of the altercation, according to a prosecutor who referred to the abuse claims as false.
According to the prosecutor, Suzanne O. Donnell, Benefield shot and killed her husband in the middle of a heated argument that she was determined to win at all costs.
In the past, she had applied for injunctions that would have prevented him from visiting their small child.
She said that she filed one in 2018 after he seemed to have broken a no-contact order they had secured against one another, but the judge rejected the injunction, stating that she didn’t believe the allegations to be true.
In 2020, Benefield accused her husband of abusing their children and requested a second injunction. At the time of his death, the processes were still in progress, and he had not been charged with any crimes related to the claims.
The judge in Benefield’s murder case told TK about her attorney’s request for a fresh trial due to claims of misbehavior by jurors and other issues.
The filing claims that one juror neglected to reveal that she had been involved in a custody battle with her ex-husband, who accused her of engaging in abusive behavior. These facts, the filing claims, mirrored the prosecution’s theory regarding Benefield and would have cast doubt on the juror’s capacity to serve impartially.
According to the lawsuit, a person who claimed a sibling had snuck in a phone and was giving him real-time information about the case may have heard specifics of the proceedings from another juror who had a smartphone in the jury room.
Under the handle “That Hoodie Guy,” the individual subsequently shared the information on a news website, the lawsuit states.
Prosecutors argued in a different brief that there was no proof the jury’s fact-finding procedure had been tampered with, even if someone was giving real-time information.
Prosecutors stated in the filing that a study of the transcript revealed that the juror in the custody dispute had not suppressed any information.
“Had defense counsel exercised due diligence and followed up on the questions asked, he may have received the answers he sought,” the paperwork adds.
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