The cross-country odyssey of a pair of glamorous twin sisters who found fame teaching yoga to the elite of South Florida and ignominy in a series of criminal incidents in Utah ended in bizarre tragedy May 29 when a white 2016 Ford Explorer veered off Hana Highway and plunged 200 feet onto a rocky shoreline.
Initial reports indicated that two 37-year-old women were in the vehicle. One, later identified as Anastasia Duval of Haiku, died at the scene; the other, purportedly her sister Alexandria Duval, was taken in critical condition to Maui Memorial Medical Center.
Witnesses told police that two women were arguing in the parked vehicle when the driver apparently drove the vehicle into a rock wall on the side of the roadway and off the sheer cliff.
The circumstances of the incident remain murky, but in the days that followed, the true identities of the two women were confirmed, revealing a story worthy of a Lifetime movie.
The real name of the woman who died in the accident is Ann Dadow. The injured woman is her identical twin, Alison, as confirmed by a private investigator retained by South Florida gossip columnist Jose Lambiet.
The sisters, who were born in Utica, N.Y., opened their first Twin Power Yoga studio in Palm Beach Gardens in 2008. The studio attracted a strong following, leading to a second location in West Palm Beach three years later.
With their striking blond looks and high-power clientele, the twins were a conspicuous presence in the Palm Beach community, traveling in matching Porsches and frequenting the tony Worth Avenue shopping district.
“They were very well respected here for a while,” said Lambiet, a former reporter for the New York Daily News and founder of the online gossip site GossipExtra. “But when you get successful, it’s easy to start overspending. This is Palm Beach. Once you start shopping on Worth Avenue, it can get out of control pretty quickly.”
Lambiet suspects that such had become the case by 2014, when the sisters abruptly closed their studios without notice, leaving numerous employees unpaid and hundreds of clients — including many new ones attracted by a recent Groupon special — with worthless, unrefunded memberships.
“They just vanished overnight,” Lambiet said.
The sisters soon reappeared in Park City, Utah, where they opened another studio. In an interview with the Park Record, Ann Dadow, going by the first name “Anna,” discussed the new studio’s various offerings, including lessons in vinsaya yoga, eight-day yoga instructor certification, “doga” (a yoga class for dogs) and a yoga merchandise shop. Dadow claimed that she and her sister were also masters of the Japanese healing art reiki.
While in Utah the sisters also began marketing “Spirit Water,” which Dadow described in an online biography as an “innovative, ‘new-age’ water” that she and her sister created.
The Dadows’ time in Utah was fraught with financial and legal troubles.
In 2014 both sisters filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection, citing hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt.
Court records show that Ann Dadow was arrested for public intoxication, disorderly conduct, assault on a police officer and interference with an arrest relating to a March 19, 2014, incident. Her previous criminal record includes convictions in Florida for disorderly intoxication, battery and resisting arrest, and arrests for misdemeanor offenses in North Carolina.
Alison Dadow’s criminal record in Utah includes arrests on suspicion of driving under the influence, fleeing the scene of an accident, driving without proof of insurance, public intoxication and disorderly conduct. She was previously arrested in Florida for allegedly defrauding an innkeeper and other unspecified offenses.
According to Lambiet, the sisters apparently arrived on Maui sometime in December. His earliest confirmed account of the Dadows on the island was an incident in which Ann Dadow went to the Family Life Center homeless shelter, claiming that she had been separated from her sister and robbed, and needed money to return to the mainland.
It is not yet known what the sisters had been doing on Maui and when they adopted their pseudonyms.
Lambiet said it is likely they chose “Duval” in reference to a famous street in Key West, Fla.
“They’re slippery,” Lambiet said.
