Fatal Fall: Unraveling The Duval Twins' Crash

WEBVTT

1
00:00:25.559 --> 00:00:31.120
On the twenty ninth of May twenty
sixteen, a Ford Explorer suv was driving

2
00:00:31.160 --> 00:00:36.399
down Hana Highway in Maui, Hawaii. The sixty four mile long Hanah Highway

3
00:00:36.520 --> 00:00:41.280
is often nicknamed the Road to Hanna
and is a popular scenic drive, with

4
00:00:41.399 --> 00:00:46.640
more than fifty bridges to drive over, surrounded by waterfalls and a native forest.

5
00:00:47.479 --> 00:00:53.119
Several witnesses watched as the suv suddenly
swerved off the road, taking a

6
00:00:53.159 --> 00:00:59.000
sharp turn and plummeting two hundred feet
to the bottom of a cliff. Emergency

7
00:00:59.039 --> 00:01:03.759
services were called and quickly arrived on
the scene. They found two people inside

8
00:01:03.840 --> 00:01:08.480
the car somehow, despite the two
hundred foot drop. The driver had only

9
00:01:08.519 --> 00:01:14.640
sustained a couple of injuries. However, the passenger had not been so lucky

10
00:01:15.000 --> 00:01:19.280
and was pronounced dead at the scene. The two occupants of the suv were

11
00:01:19.280 --> 00:01:26.799
identified as thirty seven year old twin
sisters. The deceased passenger was Anastasia Duval,

12
00:01:26.359 --> 00:01:30.359
and her twin sister, Alexandria Duval, had been behind the wheel.

13
00:01:32.000 --> 00:01:36.159
The Duval sisters had been born in
Utica, New York, in nineteen seventy

14
00:01:36.200 --> 00:01:41.159
eight, but as children they had
gone by different names which they decided to

15
00:01:41.280 --> 00:01:48.400
change together. As adults, Anastasia
had been named Anne and Alexandria had been

16
00:01:48.480 --> 00:01:53.920
named Allison. The twins remained close
throughout their childhoods and teenage years, especially

17
00:01:53.959 --> 00:01:59.480
after their mother passed away when they
were both only five. As young adults

18
00:01:59.560 --> 00:02:02.599
and estate, Asia and Alexandria moved
to Palm Beach County, Florida, and

19
00:02:02.840 --> 00:02:07.719
used their shared passion for health and
wellness to start up a yoga studio together,

20
00:02:08.360 --> 00:02:14.520
which they called Twin Power Yoga.
The business venture was a success,

21
00:02:14.919 --> 00:02:19.280
and soon they were running multiple studios. They quickly became well known in the

22
00:02:19.280 --> 00:02:23.960
local area for driving around their matching
Porsches, and they had a reputation for

23
00:02:23.039 --> 00:02:30.240
being eccentric and outgoing in the community. One year, the twins were approached

24
00:02:30.280 --> 00:02:34.879
by a producer who wanted to make
a reality television show about their lives.

25
00:02:35.439 --> 00:02:40.120
Both Alexandria and Anastasia were excited about
the potential of a TV show, and

26
00:02:40.199 --> 00:02:45.879
when the producers advised them that they
should rent a much larger and more expensive

27
00:02:45.919 --> 00:02:50.479
studio space to film in, the
twins agreed. However, the plans for

28
00:02:50.520 --> 00:02:53.800
the show ended up falling through,
and the sisters quickly found that they could

29
00:02:53.840 --> 00:02:58.879
not afford the rent for the new
studio. Before they knew it, they

30
00:02:58.879 --> 00:03:02.960
were in a significant again amount of
debt. According to Leslie McMichael, who

31
00:03:04.000 --> 00:03:07.479
worked as a spiritual advisor to the
twins, the reality show falling through was

32
00:03:07.520 --> 00:03:15.159
when the twins' lives really started to
spiral downwards. By twenty fourteen, Alexandria

33
00:03:15.280 --> 00:03:22.719
and Anastasia decided to close Twin Power
Yoga studios overnight. They blindsided their employees,

34
00:03:22.759 --> 00:03:27.639
who were left without jobs and never
received their final paychecks, and also

35
00:03:27.719 --> 00:03:32.759
ripped off their loyal customers who had
prepaid for expensive memberships. The Duval twins

36
00:03:32.879 --> 00:03:38.960
reputation in Florida was now shattered,
and a local gossip site even referred to

37
00:03:38.000 --> 00:03:44.319
them by the nickname the Terrible Twins
of Yoga. Instead of making amends,

38
00:03:44.360 --> 00:03:47.520
the pair decided that they would relocate
to make a new life in Park City,

39
00:03:47.639 --> 00:03:52.319
Utah. They even decided to write
a book, which is why they

40
00:03:52.439 --> 00:03:59.599
legally changed their first names to officially
become Alexandria and Anastasia Duval. While living

41
00:03:59.639 --> 00:04:02.080
in Park City, the twins tried
to get back into the yoga and wellness

42
00:04:02.120 --> 00:04:08.080
industry, opening one small studio in
the area. However, they hadn't been

43
00:04:08.080 --> 00:04:12.759
able to leave their financial failures behind
when they moved away from Florida. They

44
00:04:12.759 --> 00:04:15.959
were still significantly in debt, and
each of them owed around one hundred and

45
00:04:15.959 --> 00:04:20.759
fifty thousand dollars, which neither of
them could afford to pay back. In

46
00:04:20.800 --> 00:04:25.879
the end, they had no other
choice but to file for bankruptcy. The

47
00:04:25.959 --> 00:04:30.600
twins time in Utah is also when
they really began to fight with each other.

48
00:04:30.279 --> 00:04:35.560
They had personality differences that caused them
to clash often. According to their

49
00:04:35.600 --> 00:04:41.920
spiritual advisor, Leslie, Anastasia was
more timid and the sweetest, kindest,

50
00:04:42.160 --> 00:04:47.040
most level headed person you would ever
meet, whereas Alexandria was more controlling and

51
00:04:47.120 --> 00:04:53.480
had a big, dominant personality.
The difference between the twins was magnified when

52
00:04:53.480 --> 00:04:58.639
they got drunk, and in Utah
they got drunk a lot. In January

53
00:04:58.720 --> 00:05:02.360
twenty fourteen, they ended up being
banned from a local restaurant for getting too

54
00:05:02.439 --> 00:05:08.439
intoxicated and causing a scene. They
also got into a car accident where their

55
00:05:08.480 --> 00:05:13.160
car ended up in a ditch after
they started fighting behind the wheel. When

56
00:05:13.160 --> 00:05:16.639
the cops arrived at the scene,
they tried to stop Alexandria and Anastasia from

57
00:05:16.680 --> 00:05:21.240
pulling each other's hair out, the
twins fought with them too. By the

58
00:05:21.360 --> 00:05:27.879
end of twenty fifteen, the twins
had relocated again, ending up in Hawaii

59
00:05:28.160 --> 00:05:32.439
on what they described as a religious
quest. However, their journeys towards peaceful

60
00:05:32.600 --> 00:05:38.240
spirituality didn't appear to be working out
for them. Only a few weeks after

61
00:05:38.240 --> 00:05:42.759
they got to Hawaii, both of
the sisters were arrested for quote terroristic,

62
00:05:42.800 --> 00:05:47.759
threatening, and disorderly conduct. Regardless, they eventually settled into life in Hawaii,

63
00:05:48.079 --> 00:05:51.680
moving in with their boyfriends so that
the four of them could all live

64
00:05:51.759 --> 00:05:59.319
together in Maui. Romantic attachments had
always been hard for Anastasia and Alexandria because

65
00:05:59.360 --> 00:06:03.839
of their codependency. They had never
really lived with anyone apart from each other,

66
00:06:04.120 --> 00:06:09.600
and they found it difficult to find
partners who understood their close bond.

67
00:06:10.240 --> 00:06:15.480
Their spiritual advisor stated, Alexandria and
Anastasia realized that love was not in the

68
00:06:15.519 --> 00:06:20.600
future because they were so codependent,
adding that she would joke that the only

69
00:06:20.639 --> 00:06:26.519
people who would understand them were a
pair of male twins who would understand that

70
00:06:26.560 --> 00:06:30.399
they needed to be together. On
the weekend that the crash took place,

71
00:06:30.839 --> 00:06:36.639
Anastasia was meant to be on a
romantic camping getaway with her boyfriend Frederico Bailey.

72
00:06:38.279 --> 00:06:43.199
However, Alexandria hadn't wanted to be
left out, so she invited herself

73
00:06:43.319 --> 00:06:47.319
on the camping trip as well,
causing an argument between her and Anastasia.

74
00:06:47.920 --> 00:06:53.319
At one point during the trip,
Frederico was left alone while the twins went

75
00:06:53.399 --> 00:06:57.360
somewhere without him. He noticed that
they were in a much better mood when

76
00:06:57.399 --> 00:07:01.040
they returned, but then realized that
they had gone out to buy alcohol and

77
00:07:01.120 --> 00:07:06.800
now they were drunk. Fredrico was
upset by this. He knew Anastasia had

78
00:07:06.800 --> 00:07:12.040
a drinking problem and she was a
completely different person when she was under the

79
00:07:12.079 --> 00:07:16.240
influence. One of Anastasia's previous partners
had described the twins as being great people

80
00:07:16.399 --> 00:07:19.959
when they were sober, but the
minute they started drinking, they were like

81
00:07:20.279 --> 00:07:26.360
Jeckyl and Hide. Frederico took a
moment to himself, trying to calm down,

82
00:07:26.839 --> 00:07:30.120
and when he came back, the
twins had driven off in the suv.

83
00:07:30.959 --> 00:07:35.600
Shortly afterwards, the vehicle plummeted off
the cliff. Investigators spoke to several

84
00:07:35.639 --> 00:07:40.800
people who had watched the incident,
and from the way the witnesses described the

85
00:07:40.839 --> 00:07:46.120
crash, it became clear that it
may not have been an accident at all.

86
00:07:46.160 --> 00:07:49.480
Multiple people agreed that they had heard
the twins yelling at each other as

87
00:07:49.480 --> 00:07:54.279
they drove past, and it sounded
like they had been arguing about something.

88
00:07:55.040 --> 00:08:00.759
Several witnesses had also seen Anastasia reach
over from the passenger seat to grab Alexandria's

89
00:08:00.759 --> 00:08:03.759
hair, and they also believed that
she had been trying to take hold of

90
00:08:03.800 --> 00:08:11.319
the steering wheel before the suv swerved
off of the cliff. Alexandria had accelerated

91
00:08:11.399 --> 00:08:16.079
quickly before pulling the steering wheel all
the way to the left. It didn't

92
00:08:16.120 --> 00:08:18.920
appear that she had tried to slow
down when she realized the car was going

93
00:08:18.959 --> 00:08:24.279
off the road. Instead, she
sped up and had driven off the cliff

94
00:08:24.399 --> 00:08:30.519
intentionally. Based on the evidence of
the scene, investigators confirmed that Alexandria had

95
00:08:30.600 --> 00:08:37.039
made no attempt to break On June
third, twenty sixteen, the police located

96
00:08:37.120 --> 00:08:41.240
Alexandria Duval staying at a hotel in
Maui. She was placed under arrest for

97
00:08:41.320 --> 00:08:48.960
her sister's second degree murder. Although
Alexandria was initially held without bail. Only

98
00:08:48.000 --> 00:08:52.039
five days later, the murder charges
were dropped due to a lack of evidence,

99
00:08:52.320 --> 00:08:56.519
and she was released back into the
community. However, despite the judge

100
00:08:56.600 --> 00:09:01.320
ruling that there was insufficient evidence,
prosecutors working on the case were still able

101
00:09:01.360 --> 00:09:07.159
to bring it to a grand jury. In October two thousand sixteen, Alexandria

102
00:09:07.320 --> 00:09:11.879
was indicted by the grand jury,
causing her to be arrested a second time.

103
00:09:13.440 --> 00:09:16.960
She was in New York at the
time of her arrest and transported back

104
00:09:16.000 --> 00:09:22.000
to Hawaii, where her bail was
set at three million dollars. In February

105
00:09:22.120 --> 00:09:26.039
the following year, she was released
on bail. Alexandria's attorney filed to have

106
00:09:26.120 --> 00:09:31.679
her case dismissed, but when it
was denied, Alexandria then decided to waive

107
00:09:31.759 --> 00:09:35.960
her own right to be tried by
a jury. At her trial in twenty

108
00:09:35.039 --> 00:09:39.879
eighteen, Alexandria's attorney argued that the
crash had been nothing more than a tragic

109
00:09:41.039 --> 00:09:46.720
accident, claiming that Alexandria was heartbroken
by the loss of her sister. Despite

110
00:09:46.720 --> 00:09:52.159
the eyewitness reports and the evidence of
an extremely dysfunctional relationship between the twins.

111
00:09:52.759 --> 00:09:58.399
The judge presiding over the case found
that Alexandria was not guilty of her sister's

112
00:09:58.480 --> 00:10:15.559
murder. That's ten Minute Murder for
today brief and binge able true crime.

113
00:10:16.039 --> 00:10:18.120
I'm Joe. I'm the host,
and thank you for taking the time to

114
00:10:18.159 --> 00:10:20.919
listen to the podcast. If you're
a brand new listener, this is the

115
00:10:20.960 --> 00:10:24.799
first episode you're checking out. What
a weird one to first listen to.

116
00:10:26.840 --> 00:10:30.399
They're not normally like that at the
end. Usually there's some closure, there's

117
00:10:30.440 --> 00:10:35.200
some type of and this happens.
It's all over the end, But that

118
00:10:35.279 --> 00:10:37.440
one you just kind of got left
hanging a little bit, I feel like,

119
00:10:37.840 --> 00:10:41.799
but I mean, it is what
it is. And like I said,

120
00:10:41.840 --> 00:10:45.399
if you are new, make sure
you hit subscribe wherever you like to

121
00:10:45.440 --> 00:10:48.240
listen to podcasts, probably where you're
listening right now, and you can email

122
00:10:48.279 --> 00:10:52.480
me Joe at ten Minute Murder dot
com. And here is one of those

123
00:10:52.480 --> 00:10:56.000
emails. Hey, Joe, I'm
an og listener to ten Minute Murder.

124
00:10:56.080 --> 00:11:00.519
HAVE told so many people about your
podcast that I lost count a long time

125
00:11:00.559 --> 00:11:03.000
ago. Now, anytime I see
one of them somewhere, we usually end

126
00:11:03.080 --> 00:11:07.879
up talking about one or more of
the stories. From the episodes. So

127
00:11:07.919 --> 00:11:11.039
the reason I'm writing is because there
was a short period of time years ago

128
00:11:11.480 --> 00:11:16.240
that you had a ten minute murder
song, but it disappeared quickly. Can

129
00:11:16.279 --> 00:11:20.519
you play it once? For old
time's sake? Love You and the show

130
00:11:20.759 --> 00:11:26.159
Terry in Arizona and Terry, I
almost forgot about that song. Yeah,

131
00:11:26.240 --> 00:11:28.879
I can. If I can find
it, I would definitely, But you

132
00:11:28.960 --> 00:11:31.840
know what, this is recorded.
I can just hit pause and meet talking

133
00:11:31.919 --> 00:11:35.399
right now and go find it.
Hold on all right, and through the

134
00:11:35.440 --> 00:11:39.519
magic of recording, I will now
play the ten minute murder song that I

135
00:11:39.559 --> 00:11:41.679
have not played in years because I'm
not really a fan of it anymore.

136
00:11:41.720 --> 00:11:43.600
I liked it for a second,
but then I'm like, ah, I

137
00:11:43.639 --> 00:11:46.799
don't like this anymore, so I
stopped playing it. But it's going to

138
00:11:46.840 --> 00:11:50.879
close the show this time. Don't
get used to it, because I'm not

139
00:11:50.879 --> 00:11:54.159
gonna do this probably ever again.
So here it is. Goodbye. Ten

140
00:11:54.720 --> 00:12:03.240
minute, ten minute, ten minute
murder, ten minute, ten minute,

141
00:12:03.480 --> 00:12:13.360
ten minute murder, ten minute,
ten minute, ten minute murder, ten

142
00:12:13.919 --> 00:12:18.279
minute, ten minute, ten minute
murder.