The widow of the killer behind one of Aspen’s most sensational murder cases claims the brutal slaying of socialite Nancy Pfister sparked a devastating chain of tragedy that destroyed lives long after her husband confessed to the crime.
In an exclusive interview with the Daily Mail over a decade later, Nancy Masson, 75, said the fallout from the 2014 murder left her unemployable and ostracized, and drove another woman to suicide.
Wealthy socialite Pfister, 57, who had dated Jack Nicholson and was once engaged to Michael Douglas, was beaten to death with a hammer and axe inside her $18.5 million Colorado mansion on February 26, 2014.
Her body was bound, wrapped in garbage bags, and stashed in a closet.
Pfister, the daughter of Buttermilk Ski Area founder Art Pfister, was a well-known figure in the exclusive resort town and her murder stunned the wealthy mountain community.
Investigators initially accused both Trey Styler and Masson of killing Pfister before Styler later confessed to carrying out the murder alone while the socialite slept.
The couple had been renting Pfister’s sprawling log cabin while the heiress travelled to Australia, before she cut her trip short to confront them over allegedly missing rent payments. They had stopped paying due to minor faults such as broken sockets and a leaky faucet.
Masson said the accusations and publicity surrounding the case left both her and Pfister’s assistant, Kathy Carpenter, who discovered the body, permanently scarred.
Colorado socialite Nancy Pfister was found wrapped in carpet and bags and stuffed in the closet of her Aspen home on February 26, 2014. She had been bludgeoned about the head with a hammer as she slept
William ‘Trey’ Styler III later confessed to killing Pfister while she slept inside her luxury Aspen home, effectively clearing his wife of wrongdoing
‘Kathy Carpenter died by suicide,’ Masson claimed. ‘She couldn’t go out without wearing a wig because they called her a killer. They destroyed us both.’
Despite Styler’s confession, suspicions lingered for years over whether the frail former anesthesiologist could really have carried out the savage killing alone.
Ravaged by a debilitating neurological condition that often left him confined to a wheelchair, Styler nevertheless claimed he bludgeoned Pfister to death, bound her body with electrical cords, dragged her into a closet and even flipped over a blood-soaked mattress to conceal evidence of the crime.
An obituary for Carpenter confirmed that she passed away ‘suddenly’ in January of 2023 and had been going by the name ‘Sati’ in her later years.
Masson insisted that despite everything that happened afterward, she never lost sight of the fact that Pfister was the victim, telling the Daily Mail: ‘Nobody deserves to die like that.’
Pfister’s body was found by Carpenter, bound, wrapped in plastic garbage bags and hidden under sheets in her closet on February 24, 2014.
Known around Aspen as part of Pfister’s inner circle, Carpenter had been helping care for the socialite’s $18.5 million West Buttermilk Road home while she traveled to Australia.
Detectives zeroed in on Carpenter after scrutinizing her emotional 911 call reporting the discovery of Pfister’s body and later suggested that her behavior showed ‘indicators of guilt’.
Nancy Masson, now, 75, told the Daily Mail that the fallout from the shocking murder ‘destroyed’ her life long after her husband confessed to the killing
Masson (left) said she spent years struggling to rebuild her life after she was jailed for 108 days before being cleared in the murder case. Pfister’s assistant, Kathy Carpenter, who discovered the body and was also investigated, died by suicide in 2023
Investigators also learned that Carpenter and Pfister had argued before the killing, further fueling suspicion around her involvement.
Masson herself admitted to initially believing that Carpenter was guilty – before her husband confessed to killing Pfister.
‘I went into jail knowing I was innocent,’ Masson said. ‘I had no idea that it was my husband, none whatsoever. I thought my husband was innocent, too.’
Shortly after his confession, Carpenter apologized to Masson for introducing the couple to Pfister and drawing them into the toxic situation surrounding the Colorado mansion.
Masson, who spent 108 days in jail before being cleared of involvement, said the public obsession with the infamous Aspen case permanently shattered the lives of everyone dragged into it.
‘I had people that wouldn’t let their children be around me because I was a murderer,’ she told the Daily Mail.
‘There’s still people today that think I did it and that he was covering for me. People always want to think the worst of you.’
The 75-year-old moved out of her beloved Colorado following her arrest, back to her hometown of New Bedford, Massachusetts, with her mother.
Her husband Trey filed for divorce shortly after he was convicted of the killing and sentenced to 20 years behind bars. But the former anesthesiologist died by suicide in his cell less than a year into his sentence.
Pfister, the daughter of Buttermilk Ski Area founder Art Pfister, was a well-known figure in Aspen’s elite social scene before her shocking murder stunned the resort town in Colorado
Masson and Styler had been renting Pfister’s sprawling log cabin while the heiress was in Australia, before she cut her trip short to confront them over allegedly missing rent payments
Court documents and Styler’s videotaped confession later described how he left the motel room while Masson slept, drove to Pfister’s house and killed her before moving her body into the closet.
In his confession, Trey Styler said: ‘I lost my mind, or at least my rational mind. It was me. It was all me.’
Masson said she still struggles to reconcile the confession with the man she knew.
‘There was never once a time of physical violence to me,’ she added. ‘He was the wind beneath my wings.’
The fallout from the killing continued long after Styler’s confession.
Pfister’s daughter Juliana later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Masson alleging that Styler’s severe health problems made it unlikely he acted alone.
The civil case eventually ended in a confidential settlement in 2016. Court records later showed that Juliana received $850,000 from a $1 million life insurance policy Masson collected following Styler’s death.
Masson eventually filed for bankruptcy in Massachusetts under her maiden name, and took care of her ailing mother in the last years of her life.
Detectives zeroed in on Carpenter after scrutinizing her emotional 911 call reporting the discovery of Pfister’s body, and later suggested that her behavior showed ‘indicators of guilt’
Masson said she still struggles to reconcile the confession with the man she knew. Styler died by suicide in his cell in 2015 less than a year into his sentence
Now living quietly in Massachusetts, far from the elite Aspen circles she once moved in, Masson says she is only now starting to recover.
‘I’m beginning to heal a little bit from it,’ she said. ‘It changed the trajectory of my life. I would not have been here if all of that hadn’t happened.’
She now cuts a very different figure from the woman who once moved in the wealthiest social circles.
Exclusive Daily Mail photos show her browsing discount stores and running errands near her modest home.
Despite wearing hearing aids and having a medical alert device hanging around her neck, Masson still presents herself with the polished glamour of her former life.
She still has a gold ring with an amethyst on her wedding finger, and makes the effort to style her blonde locks.
Masson now works at a cannabis dispensary near her home after years of struggling to rebuild her life and career following a stint working as an esthetician.
She says that the Aspen allegations cost her multiple jobs, with one employer withdrawing an offer the morning she was due to start work – and a colleague quitting before she even started.
Exclusive Daily Mail photos show Masson living a quiet life in Massachusetts more than a decade after the sensational Aspen murder case thrust her into the national spotlight
‘I lost four jobs before I even started,’ she said. ‘I had to make my own business because no one would employ me.’
Since Styler’s death, Masson has struggled to maintain a relationship, dating one person since returning to the East Coast.
But ultimately his family became aware of the allegations against her, pushing him into ending their short-lived dalliance.
Meanwhile, the sprawling Aspen mansion where Pfister was killed remains haunted by the shadow of the crime.
The multimillion-dollar property has been repeatedly listed for sale in the years since the murder and is currently back on the market for $18.5 million.
Records show that the estate has been held in a Pfister family trust since 2009, but has not managed to shake off its grisly history with a sale.
