Where is Ashley Britt McArthur Now? We explain where the person who murdered Taylor Wright is now in 2023.
Taylor Wright was a young private investigator in Pensacola, Florida. In 2017, she was murdered by her best friend Ashley Britt McArthur. McAthur tried to hide the crime, covering up Wright’s disappearance by sending fake text messages to her loved ones and hiding the body in a wooded area.
The crime shocked the local community, especially because it was thought the pair were best friends. But a subsequent investigation showed a rocky relationship that ended in Wright’s death.
Who is Ashley Britt McArthur and what happened to Taylor Wright?
Born on August 22, 1977, Ashley Britt McArthur was a crime scene technician from Pensacola, Florida. She was best friends with Taylor Wright, the then 33-year-old private investigator from the same area. But this didn’t turn out to be the case, as on October 9, 2017, McArthur was arrested for the murder of Wright, of which she was later convicted.
Wright was going through a difficult divorce before her death and had just moved in with her girlfriend Casandra Waller. When Wright went missing in September, investigators first concluded that no foul play was involved. Wright had sent her girlfriend a text message saying that she needed to get away for a few days. Her loved ones didn’t believe this and said Wright wasn’t the type of person to just leave and that the language used in the text message wasn’t the language that Wright used.
Later on, investigators established that the last time Wright was seen was with her best friend Ashley Britt McArthur. They questioned McArthur, and she said that the pair had stopped by her house in Pensacola. When McArthur came back outside, she found that Wright had disappeared.
Investigators looked into McArthur and found on August 16, McArthur had deposited a cashier’s check for $34,000 in Wright’s name into her personal bank account, which she then spent. Wright found out about this and tried to get the money back, which led to her death.
Investigators searched a property that was owned by McArthur and her family and found Wright’s body in a wooded area nearby. She had been shot in the head. McArthur was arrested and charged with first-degree murder.
She was also convicted of racketeering and organized fraud. In the two years leading up to Wright’s murder, McArthur had been skimming thousands of dollars from jukeboxes that her family business had rented to different bars.
McArthur was convicted of first-degree murder but later appealed this conviction. She argued that the jury had accidentally seen a photograph of herself pointing a shotgun, which colored their opinion of her. She also said that the court had erred in allowing some of the evidence that had been presented, like statements to investigators, phone records, and Wright’s text messages.
Ultimately, in April 2021, the Florida First District Court of Appeal upheld the first-degree murder conviction and life sentence.
Where is Ashley Britt McArthur Now?
Ashley Britt McArthur is currently serving her life sentence in prison at the Lowell Annex Correctional Institution in Ocala. She’ll remain there for several decades unless she receives parole, which in that case she will go back on the streets.
How long will Ashley Britt McArthur be in prison?
Ashley Britt McArthur was given a life sentence for her crimes, and will now have to spend a long time in jail. She might eventually become eligible for parole, but this requires her to serve part of her sentence first.
