Chesterfield police say Ashlee Butler was preparing to leave when she was killed.
CHESTERFIELD, Va. — Concerns from relatives and witnesses helped investigators reexamine a woman’s reported suicide and charge her husband years later with killing her, police said.
Ashlee Butler, 36, was found Dec. 20, 2021, at a home on Alberta Road in Chesterfield County. Her death was first reported as a suicide. Police now say the scene had been staged and that her injuries did not match the first account. Her husband, Ross Butler, 56, was arrested May 27 in Florida after a Virginia grand jury indicted him.
The case centers on what police say happened when Ashlee Butler returned to the home. A Chesterfield police spokesperson said she had gone there to pack belongings because she was preparing to leave her husband. Investigators believe she was strangled during that visit. Police also said there was a history of domestic violence in the home. Those public details have made the case less a sudden break than a slow reversal: what was first presented to authorities as self-inflicted harm is now described by investigators as a staged killing inside a marriage that was ending.
Family members and witnesses were important to that reversal, according to police. Authorities said people who knew Ashlee Butler came forward with concerns about the circumstances of her death. The public statements do not identify those witnesses, describe their relationships to her or detail what they told detectives. But police have made clear that the original report did not settle the case. Their statements show investigators treated the witness concerns, the scene evidence and the injury findings together before seeking charges from a grand jury more than four years later.
The time gap remains one of the clearest features of the case. Ashlee Butler was found in late 2021. Ross Butler was not publicly charged until May 2026. During that span, authorities have said, detectives continued investigating. They have not released a full timeline of interviews, forensic reviews, medical findings or search warrants. The delay may become a major issue in court as prosecutors explain how the case developed and defense lawyers test whether evidence was preserved, how memories were recorded and what changed between the first report and the indictment.
Virginia prosecutors took the case to a Chesterfield grand jury, which indicted Butler on May 18. Florida authorities later described the warrant as including first-degree murder, first-degree murder through abduction, felony homicide and strangulation. News accounts based on law enforcement statements have also described the indictment as murder and strangulation charges. The core allegation is the same across those summaries: Butler is accused of killing Ashlee Butler and creating a false appearance of suicide. He has not entered a public plea in the materials released so far, and he is presumed innocent unless convicted.
After the indictment, investigators had to find him. Authorities said Butler was known to be in Flagler County, Florida, a coastal area far from the Chesterfield home where the case began. The Flagler County Sheriff’s Office said it was contacted May 26 to help locate and arrest him. Flagler Beach detectives had identified a local motel connected to Butler. Deputies then learned he had been admitted to AdventHealth Palm Coast. The next day, after his release from the hospital, members of the sheriff’s Criminal Intelligence Unit and Fugitive Apprehension Unit stopped him outside the building.
Butler was brought to the sheriff’s operations center in Bunnell, where Chesterfield County detectives interviewed him before he was booked into the Sheriff Perry Hall Inmate Detention Facility. Authorities said he is being held without bond while awaiting extradition to Virginia. The public record does not state whether the interview produced statements prosecutors plan to use, whether Butler declined to answer questions or whether a defense attorney was present. Those questions may be answered later through court filings if prosecutors seek to introduce any statement he made after the Florida arrest.
Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly said the arrest showed cooperation among agencies. “This case is an excellent example of teamwork and serves as a warning to fugitives that you can’t avoid the long arm of the law, especially in Flagler County,” Staly said. He also said Butler “thought he could get away with murder and live the rest of his life at the beach.” The quote reflected the Florida agency’s view of the arrest, but the homicide case belongs to Virginia. Chesterfield prosecutors will carry the burden of proving the charges in court.
Ashlee Butler’s final days are still only partly public. Police have said she was preparing to leave, had gone home to pack and died after being strangled. Some reports say she later died at a hospital on Dec. 23, 2021, which was her 37th birthday, but the official statements summarized in the arrest releases focus on when she was found at the home and why police now reject the suicide report. Officials have not released a complete account of who called 911, what was said in the original report or what items in the house led detectives to conclude the scene was staged.
The case may also bring renewed attention to how death investigations proceed when a first report appears to explain what happened. Police have said they did not accept that first report after reviewing the evidence and hearing from people who knew Ashlee Butler. That point is likely to be central at trial. Prosecutors may rely on medical findings, scene reconstruction, witness testimony and prior domestic violence evidence if a judge permits it. Defense lawyers may challenge the staging theory, the timeline and the meaning of the injuries.
For now, the public record remains narrow but serious. A woman who police say was leaving her marriage is dead. Her husband is jailed in Florida on a Virginia warrant. A grand jury has found enough evidence to charge him, but a trial has not been held. The next milestone is Butler’s extradition to Chesterfield County, where the witness concerns that helped reopen the case may become sworn testimony.
Author note: Last updated June 23, 2026.