Disclaimer: Article contains mentions of murder. Readers are advised to exercise caution.

Florida ballerina Ashley Benefield is on trial for the murder of her husband, Doug Benefield, in her mother’s Florida home in September 2020. Multiple media outlets reported that she shot Doug multiple times and claimed he attacked her first. Despite her claims, authorities arrested Ashley Benefield for her husband’s murder. The ongoing trial, now dubbed the Black Swan Murder Trial, has revealed shocking details about their married life and how it turned sour.

People Magazine reported that Doug met Ashley in 2016 at a Republican Party fundraiser and they tied the knot 13 days apart. At the time, she was a ballerina, while Doug was a Navy veteran and a technology consultant. With the help of her husband, Ashley fulfilled her dream of opening a ballet company called The American National Ballet. However, things didn’t go as planned and the venture was a failure. Meanwhile, the former ballerina became pregnant and their relationship became more complicated.

That was when Ashley Benefield decided to move to Florida to live with her mother. According to People Magazine, although the duo had a long-distance relationship, their marriage began to deteriorate after Ashley's complaints. Furthermore, she did not tell him about the birth of the child, and Doug only found out about his daughter when Ashley filed a restraining order against him. On the day of the murder, Doug reportedly visited Ashley to help her and their daughter move to Maryland.