Hawaii woman accused of killing twin sister arrested for drunk driving
STAMFORD, N.Y. -- A woman from Hawaii who had been accused of killing her twin sister after their vehicle plunged off a Maui cliff was arrested in upstate New York on drunken driving charges.
Alexandria Duval, of Maui, was arrested Monday in the Village of Stamford in Delaware County, according to state police. She has family in upstate New York. Police said she was pulled over after almost striking a vehicle operated by a state police investigator.
Her blood alcohol content was 0.26, more than three times the legal limit, police said. Information on her lawyer wasn’t immediately available. She was ordered held on $5,000 cash bail after her arraignment in Stamford.
The 37-year-old sisters were in a Ford Explorer traveling on Hana Highway in May when they crashed into a rock wall, plunging about 200 feet onto a rocky shoreline during what was described as a hair-pulling fight over the steering wheel.
Anastasia Duval was killed and Alexandria was arrested and jailed on a second-degree murder charge, accused of deliberately causing her sister’s death. A judge later ordered Alexandria’s release after determining there was no probable cause for a murder charge.
The judge had said that prosecutors did not present enough evidence to support the charge of intentional murder, reports Hawaii News Now.
The twins ran two popular Twin Power studios in Palm Beach County, Florida, from 2008 to 2014 before they changed their names from Alison and Ann Dadow.
Prosecutors in Hawaii said they planned to see what other evidence they could find to further their investigation.
Alexandria Duval is due in court in Stamford on Aug. 23.
The twins had recently moved to Hawaii after spending time in Utah, and before that Florida, where they owned a yoga studio in well-to-do Palm Beach Gardens. Brett Borders, a former student of the twins, said they held the best yoga classes he has ever taken.
“They were very good at picking and training yoga instructors. They were very consistent. The best teachers around. It was just very high quality,” he said.
The sisters were living large, with fancy cars, before they suddenly closed the studios and bolted town, leaving behind bewildered customers and friends and many debts. Employees and vendors complained they hadn’t been paid, and customers’ memberships were rendered worthless.
Leslie McMichael, who became the sisters’ spiritual adviser after meeting them at a Kabala center in Florida, said their downfall began after they were approached by reality television producers who wanted to feature them on a show.
They had outgrown one of their Palm Beach Gardens studios, but instead of annexing a neighboring storefront as planned, they were persuaded by the producers to lease space on the priciest, trendiest street in West Palm Beach, McMichael said.
They were banking on the TV income to make it work, but then the show fell through and they were stuck with a lease they couldn’t afford, she said.
The sisters moved to Utah and opened a yoga studio in the high-end ski town of Park City in 2014. They had several run-ins with the police during the two years they lived in the state, and faced charges including drunken driving, intoxication and leaving the scene of an accident.
In January 2014, they were kicked out of a restaurant when their drinking got out of hand, according to police. Officers said the twins fought with each other and with police who arrived after their car slid into a ditch. Hair-pulling was also involved.
The twins legally changed their names in Utah in 2014 to write a book together, according to court documents. Both women filed for bankruptcy around the same time and reported around $150,000 in debts each, including two 2013 Porsche Boxsters.
Looking for a new start, they moved to Maui in December and planned to open yoga studios, according to Alexandria’s attorney. But they were soon charged with disorderly conduct and terroristic threatening over a Christmas Eve incident.
McMichael said their rowdy behavior doesn’t tell the twins’ full story.
Referring to them by their previous names, she described Alison (later Alexandria) as outgoing with a “big, dominant personality” and a tendency to drink too much sometimes, and called Ann (Anastasia) “the sweetest, kindest, most level-headed person you would ever meet.”
McMichael said the pair, whose mother had died when they were 5, always lived together and put their relationship ahead of their boyfriends.
“They realized that love was not in their future because they were so co-dependent,” she said. “I would joke that the only people who would understand them were a pair of male twins who would understand that they needed to be together.”