Who was Nancy Pfister and what happened to her?

NANCY Pfister was brutally murdered in February 2014. The classic Dateline episode about Pfister's case will air on Sunday, April 23, 2023. 2 Nancy Merle Pfister was born on July 4, 1956, in Orofino, Idaho to parents Betty Haas Pfister and Art Pfister.

NANCY Pfister was brutally murdered in February 2014.

The classic Dateline episode about Pfister's case will air on Sunday, April 23, 2023.

Who was Nancy Pfister and what happened to her?

Nancy Merle Pfister was born on July 4, 1956, in Orofino, Idaho to parents Betty Haas Pfister and Art Pfister.

She had two sisters named Suzanne and Christina Pfister.

According to Oxygen, Art and Betty co-founded the Buttermilk Ski Area in Aspen, Colorado, one of the location's "Four Mountains."

Their work "helped turn the sleepy town in the middle of the Rockies into a premiere winter and vacation destination."

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The Pfister family became highly prominent in Aspen.

According to the outlet, friend Rita Bellino told Oxygen's Snapped: Killer Couples: "The Pfisters were like Aspen royalty. Everyone catered to them because they basically helped put Aspen on the map."

Nancy Pfister is said to have inherited her parents' "adventurous spirit."

One of her high school boyfriends named David Koffend told CBS News' 48 Hours: "She was like -- a tornado -- she was always doing stuff."

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Pfister was also known for having dated multiple high-profile celebrities.

Close friend and artist Michael Cleverly told 48 Hours: "She had a lot of boyfriends ... as a rule they didn't last terribly long. She was a complicated girl. I'm sure it was hard for her and hard for -- the boys in her life.

"She dated Jack Nicholson ... she dated Michael Douglas, everyone knows that."

While she never married, Pfister had a daughter named Juliana Pfister.

Juliana spoke to 48 Hours and said about her mom: "She absolutely loved people. She was a complete social butterfly. ...when she walked into the room ... it was just, like, a energy force field that was -- you know, like -- a bright light.

"I've never met anyone else in the whole world like my mom. ...she was just a really, really special person."

Pfister became friends with single mom and bank teller Kathy Carpenter in the early 2000s, and Carpenter acted as Pfister's personal assistant.

In November 2013, Pfister left her Buttermilk Mountain home to travel to Australia and was renting out her property to a couple while she was away.

The couple included retired Denver physician Dr. William "Trey" Styler III and his wife, Nancy Styler.

Pfister left Carpenter to oversee the house and collect the rent during her trip.

On February 26, 2014, Carpenter called the police after finding 57-year-old Pfister's dead body inside a walk-in closet of her Aspen home.

As The Aspen Times reported, according to the homicide affidavit, her neck area was covered by a towel that had an electrical extension cord wrapped around it, and her body was wrapped "in a heavy-duty plastic trash bag" from the shoulders down. Two white plastic kitchen bags covered her head.

Aspen Daily News reported that, according to Pitkin County Coroner Dr. Steve Ayers, Pfister was "killed with three or four blows to the head."

According to the outlet, Ayers said the autopsy stated that she was killed with "a hard object with a slightly curved edge."

Who killed Nancy Pfister?

At the time of her murder, Pfister had been involved in a dispute with the Stylers.

As Oxygen reported, Pfister had claimed that the pair owed her money.

The outlet said that according to Snapped: Killer Couples, the Stylers did not deny that there was a disagreement between them and Pfister when interviewed by authorities. The couple said that once they began living at Pfister's home, she started "treating them like employees and demanded they run errands for her."

According to the publication, Nancy Styler told police that she and her husband had moved out of Pfister's home before she got back from Australia. She claimed that they could not have been responsible for the fatal crime, as they no longer had access to the property.

Trey told authorities that due to his health issues — he had a degenerative neurological disorder — he could not have killed Pfister.

As reported by Aspen Daily News, a hammer was found in a trash bag inside a garbage can near the Aspenalt Lodge in Basalt, Colorado, where the Stylers had been staying. Trey Styler's DNA was found on the bag.

The outlet states: "Among the other items found in the trash bag were 10 bottles of prescription medications with Pfister’s name on them; her passport and driver’s license; and an airline boarding pass in her name.

"All of this was found with the Stylers’ registration papers for their Jaguar sedan, miscellaneous paperwork in the Stylers’ name and a receipt for an Aspen post office box in William Styler’s name."

As the publication reported, a key to the closet where Pfister’s body was found was located on the ground near the Styler's hotel room. The same type of garbage bag as the one used to wrap Pfister’s body was located in the Styler's Jaguar.

As reported by CBS News, Trey, then 65, and Nancy Styler, then 62, were arrested and charged with first-degree murder at the Aspenalt Lodge on March 3, 2014.

Summit Daily reported that Carpenter was arrested and charged with first-degree murder in March 2014.

Oxygen stated: "As seen in the 'Snapped: Killer Couples' episode, after learning that Kathy Carpenter had been commiserating with the Stylers over her dislike of Pfister and questioning the consistency of statements made during her 911 call, investigators began to suspect her involvement in the crime."

ABC News reported that after pleading guilty to second-degree murder, Trey received a 20-year prison sentence in June 2014.

After he confessed, the murder charges against Nancy Styler and Carpenter were dropped.

According to Aspen Daily News, Nancy Styler moved to Massachusetts and changed her last name to Masson.

On August 6, 2015, Trey died at the age of 67 after hanging himself in his prison cell, as reported by the Aspen Daily News.

According to Oxygen, following Trey's death, Masson attempted to collect a $1million life insurance policy. Trey had taken out the policy, and Masson was the beneficiary.

However, as reported by the Aspen Times, Masson was ordered to give back the $1million after Juliana Pfister filed a $25million wrongful-death lawsuit against Masson in 2016.

The Aspen Daily News reported that in June 2016, Juliana's claim was resolved and that she was "expected to receive" $850,000 of the $1million life insurance benefit Masson acquired after Trey's death.

Carpenter and Masson have repeatedly said that they are innocent of Pfister's murder.

How can I watch the Dateline episode about Nancy Pfister?

A repeat Dateline episode about Pfister is airing on Sunday, April 23, 2023, at 7pm ET, 6pm CT on NBC.

Viewers can also watch the two-hour TV program on NBC.com and via Peacock.

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The @DatelineNBC Twitter account has shared multiple previews ahead of the episode's air time.

On April 23, it tweeted: "Tonight on a classic 2-hour #Dateline at 7/6c, @dateline_keith has all the details on what happened to a beautiful princess on Aspen’s Buttermilk Mountain…"

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