- FEMALE NARRATOR: Before her name
made international headlines, Nancy Pfister was the toast
of her ritzy mountain oasis.
- Everybody wanted to be like Nancy,
everybody wanted to meet her.
She didn't have a problem in the world.
- She was briefly engaged to Michael Douglas.
When the Kennedys would come into town,
she would party with them.
- In Aspen, she was the queen, for sure.
- NARRATOR: But a harrowing crime would send shockwaves
through the glamorous Aspen community.
- JASON AUSLANDER: The body was completely wrapped
in garbage bags.
They see blonde hair, and they notice,
obviously, that it's a female.
- NARRATOR: The investigation would capture media attention
around the nation.
- JIMMY NADELL: Everybody was shocked
at this gruesome murder here of a very well-loved,
local woman, who had everything going for her.
- NARRATOR: As police search for answers,
they'll uncover a desperate conspiracy.
One that culminates in a tell-all confession
that would leave those closest to the case
shaken to their core.
- That was just another indication to me
that they were being framed.
- They bonded over their mutual, I'll have to say hatred,
and what desperate people do sometimes is lash out.
- *
- [muffled scream, gasp]
- **
- NARRATOR: Known as the Beverly Hills
of the Rocky Mountains, Aspen, Colorado
is the winter retreat for the rich and famous.
- JIMMY: Aspen is a playground for billionaires.
You can get a beautiful house here,
you can land your jet within five minutes of downtown.
The skiing is 100% world class.
- NARRATOR: But on the evening of February 26th, 2014,
the glitz and glamour of the Aspen community
would dissolve into chaos,
when local police dispatchers receive a frantic 911 call.
- NARRATOR: Born in 1956,
Nancy Pfister was brought up in an exclusive community.
- Nancy is the daughter of Art Pfister.
Art Pfister was a rancher that owned the property
that was eventually developed into the Buttermilk Ski area
and the West Buttermilk super exclusive
housing developments.
- The Pfisters were like Aspen royalty,
everyone catered to them
because they basically helped put Aspen on the map.
- NARRATOR: If her parents were royalty,
Nancy was Aspen's princess.
- JIMMY: She was like Aspen's daughter.
The kid that grew up, that had everything,
everybody wanted to be like Nancy,
everybody wanted to meet her,
she didn't have a problem in the world.
- JOYCE SINGULAR: She was Aspen's welcome wagon.
She was very friendly and outgoing and gregarious.
She was briefly engaged to Michael Douglas,
she was a girlfriend to Jack Nicholson,
when the Kennedys would come into town,
she would party with them.
- You would see Nancy in town and she was the sparkle.
I mean, you knew that if you followed along with her,
you were going to find some fun.
Believe me, there was going to be some Prosecco.
There was always someone to meet and someone to have fun with.
She had the charm and the magic,
and like the Pied Piper, you just follower her.
- NARRATOR: By the early 2000s, one of Nancy's closest followers
was her best friend and personal assistant, Kathy Carpenter.
- JOYCE: Kathy Carpenter was a bank teller
at Alpine Bank in Aspen.
This was the bank that Nancy Pfister banked at.
Nancy Pfister, at one point, invited Kathy Carpenter
to become her personal assistant.
- RITA BELLINO: Kathy Carpenter
really cared about Nancy Pfister.
She became her person, like to drive her different places,
and I think she enjoyed it, because she got invited
around to places and things that she probably would not have
gotten invited to had she not been with Nancy Pfister.
- NARRATOR: As a personal assistant,
Kathy's biggest job was helping Nancy manage
the rental of her luxurious chalet.
- She would rent out her home on Buttermilk Mountain
when she would leave town during the winter.
She was traveling all over the world.
- NARRATOR: In November 2013, the 57-year-old socialite
chose Australia for a six-month getaway.
- Nancy Pfister wanted to go to Australia,
not only to get out of the cold weather of Aspen in the winter,
but she was an adventurous woman.
And she was thinking of potentially buying
some property in Australia.
- NARRATOR: Nancy had told friends she'd be returning
in May of 2014.
But, on February 26th,
three months before Nancy's anticipated arrival,
police get an alarming call from Kathy Carpenter,
who tells them she's just found Nancy's body
inside her Aspen home.
- JOYCE: Kathy Carpenter was screaming
into the 911 dispatch officer,
"My friend is dead, my friend is dead."
- JASON: Kathy is frantic and screaming.
She had just found her friend, dead,
and didn't want to go back in the house,
so she actually got in her car
and starts driving down the mountain.
- NARRATOR: When deputies arrive,
they realize Kathy is in serious distress.
- She was so distraught that they had to use a sedative
to calm her down.
- NARRATOR: While Kathy is being treated,
deputies race to Nancy Pfister's house
to investigate her claims.
- LISA MILLER: Responding deputies go into the house.
And in the call, they had been directed
to the closet in this house.
So they go to the closet. He opens the door.
He's not immediately seeing a body.
He takes a look on the floor at this pile of laundry,
it looks like sheets on the floor,
and he bends down and he pulls a sheet back,
and he sees a bit of shoulder.
He reaches down, checks for signs of life.
Having found none, he retreats,
and the death investigation
turns into a murder investigation.
- NARRATOR: Coming up,
as investigators dig deeper into their victim's life,
unsavory secrets come to light.
- JOYCE: He sent Nancy Pfister an email saying,
"Be careful what you wish for,
you may get more than you expect."
- LISA: It's always interesting when someone is saying,
very openly, how much they don't like the deceased.
- NARRATOR: In Aspen, Colorado, investigators believe
they have just found the body of 57-year-old socialite
Nancy Pfister inside her bedroom closet.
- JASON: The body was completely wrapped in garbage bags,
so as detectives removed the plastic from the body,
they see blonde hair, and they notice,
obviously, that it's a female.
And so at that point,
they're pretty sure that it's Nancy Pfister.
- LISA: That trash bag around the head
ended up concealing the actual cause of death,
and that was blunt force trauma to the head.
- NARRATOR: But something about the crime scene
doesn't add up for investigators.
- LISA: There was a smear of blood that was noticed
on the headboard of the bed in the master bedroom.
There was some droplets of blood,
maybe spray on the bedroom wall,
but not substantial amounts of blood,
that you would think based upon the head injuries
that we were seeing on the body of Nancy Pfister.
- NARRATOR: As detectives take a closer look at Nancy's bed,
they make a telling discovery.
- LISA: There was an area of a sizable amount of blood
on the underside of the mattress.
So we know our killer took the time,
and they worked to conceal what had actually happened.
- NARRATOR: Based on the blood evidence,
investigators believe Nancy had been attacked while she slept.
As they continue processing the scene,
they find little evidence to suggest a motive.
- They weren't seeing a ransacked bedroom
where somebody was going through drawers
and dumping drawers and looking for jewelry
and things like that. There was no evidence of that.
- NARRATOR: While Nancy Pfister's body
is transported to the medical examiner's office for autopsy,
investigators circle back to Nancy's friend,
and the woman who called 911, Kathy Carpenter,
for more information.
- Once Kathy calms down, she meets with investigators
at the police department and they ask her to walk them
through the crime scene,
and how she came to find Nancy's body.
And she tells them that Nancy just returned
from Australia a few days before.
- JOYCE: She had to go over to the house
to check on the dog, Gabe, and she knew that
Nancy Pfister would be sleeping, because you know,
she'd be jet lagged.
- NARRATOR: When Kathy arrived, she noticed the dog
hadn't been fed and had gone to the bathroom
inside Nancy's house multiple times.
- JOYCE: It's obvious that something is wrong.
She goes up the stairs,
and she sees what looks like bloodstains on the headboard.
She looks to the closet, and she noticed
that the key that she had left in it was gone.
- She went and grabbed her spare set of keys to Nancy's house
and she unlocked the closet door,
and at that point, she says she saw a figure in the corner
wrapped in garbage bags.
Looks a little bit closer,
and sees that it's in fact a body.
- NARRATOR: That's when Kathy drops a bombshell...
She believes she knows who killed her best friend.
The couple who had been renting Nancy Pfister's home
while she was in Australia,
Trey and Nancy Styler.
- Trey Styler was a young resident in 1980
at the very prestigious
University of Colorado Hospital in Denver
when he met Nancy Styler.
She was a nurse anesthetist at the time.
She was very wowed and impressed by Trey Styler's intelligence.
He in turn was surprised at someone with her looks.
- NARRATOR: The pair eventually married and had a son.
For the next 30 years, Trey's career,
and their fortunes, continued to rise.
- JOYCE: He finally became Chief of Anesthesiology
at Saint Joseph's Hospital in Denver,
which is another quite acclaimed hospital.
They were living in a suburb of Denver,
called Greenwood Village, which is a quite affluent suburb,
in a very large house.
- NARRATOR: But things took a turn for the worse
when Trey's health began to deteriorate in his early 60s...
...and he was diagnosed with a degenerative nerve condition
called Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease.
- He was not able to stand for long periods of time,
and had to use a wheelchair at other times.
- RITA: He could hardly walk down the stairs.
I don't know how he was functioning.
He was either in so much pain, or he was so sick,
he could barely do anything.
- NARRATOR: Because of his health condition,
Trey was no longer able to practice medicine,
and the couple had to look for new avenues to make money.
- RITA: Nancy wanted to get into the skincare thing,
because being a nurse, she could do Botox
and she could do treatments that were expensive,
so that would be an opportunity for her to make a lot of money.
- JOYCE: So, they had this idea to go up to Aspen,
they knew that that's where the money was,
and that's where they wanted to start the spa business.
- NARRATOR: The Stylers' story won Nancy Pfister over.
- JASON: Nancy Pfister and the Stylers
worked out an agreement where the Stylers
would rent her house for six months.
The Stylers would pay her $12,000,
6,000 up front, and then $6,000 when they moved in,
as part of that agreement.
- JOYCE: When they met, they were buddies, you know?
Nancy Pfister would take her to the hot springs,
and, oh, I'm gonna introduce you to my wealthy friends
in Aspen so that you'll have, you know, professional contacts.
- NARRATOR: Nancy also invited the Stylers
to move in early so she could help them settle in
before she left for her trip.
- When they moved into Nancy Pfister's house,
she, Nancy Pfister, was still there.
She hadn't left yet to Australia.
So, they live with her for about two or three weeks
before she took off.
- NARRATOR: In November 2013,
Nancy Pfister left for Australia.
But it wasn't long after that her relationship--
and rental agreement-- with the Stylers
quickly began to unravel.
Eight weeks after she left the country,
Nancy Pfister had emailed Kathy Carpenter from Australia,
and claimed that the Stylers still owed her
thousands of dollars in rent.
- JOYCE: Trey Styler and Nancy Pfister
were on Facebook together, they were friends.
And she started posting really negative things on Facebook,
and Trey was seeing this,
and this is when Nancy Styler really became angry,
because she was ruining their reputation, basically,
and their prospects of being able to meet new people,
get new clients, because Nancy Pfister was very influential.
- TERESA WYATT: She was sending them group emails.
Kathy Carpenter was cc'd. Everybody was on those emails,
"Help me, do something with these people.
"Get them out of there. Get me my money.
Anything. Do something."
And it was an ongoing theme.
I heard less about her happiness there
than I did about her anger about not getting the money.
- NARRATOR: Kathy tells police that by mid-February,
Nancy Pfister decided to fly home from Australia
three months early to take care of the issue in person.
- JOYCE: Nancy Pfister told the Stylers
that she would be back in Aspen in a few days
and to get all of their belongings out.
- JASON: Once Nancy got back to town,
the Stylers moved out of her house
and rented a hotel room in Basalt,
which is down valley from Aspen.
They moved some of their belongings out of her house,
but there was still hundreds of thousands of dollars
of equipment still left in the house
that they were going to use to build their spa
that Nancy refused to give back to them
until they paid her the money she said they owed her.
- STEPHAN SINGULAR: Nancy Pfister says,
"You owe me $14,000, you damaged my furniture,
"you did other things around my house.
I'm not going to give you back your equipment,"
this expensive equipment that Nancy Styler had
for in her spa business,
"Unless you hand over $14,000."
I mean, they didn't have anything approaching $14,000.
That's what Trey basically told Kathy Carpenter,
"We can't come up with this money."
He was already angry, his wife was already angry,
very angry, with Nancy Pfister.
- JOYCE: Trey Styler, at one point,
sent Nancy Pfister an email saying,
"Be careful what you wish for,
you may get more than you expect."
- NARRATOR: The mountain town of Aspen, Colorado
is reeling after police find 57-year-old Nancy Pfister
dead from an apparent homicide.
- JIMMY: Who in their wildest dream
would think something like this would happen?
Especially to somebody like Nancy Pfister.
She doesn't have an enemy in the world.
- NARRATOR: Nancy's best friend, Kathy Carpenter,
has implicated the late socialite's former friends
and tenants, 65-year-old Trey Styler,
and his 62-year-old wife, Nancy,
as her possible killers.
- JASON: Within about 12 hours of finding Nancy Pfister's body,
police went to the hotel in Basalt where Kathy said
the Stylers were staying.
- They asked them to come in and answer some questions.
- NARRATOR: At the station, when investigators confront Nancy
about her and her husband's feud with Nancy Pfister,
she doesn't deny it.
Instead, she tells police that Nancy Pfister
had been a demanding landlord since the moment
they moved into her home.
- JASON: Nancy Styler told police that initially
the relationship between the couple and Nancy Pfister,
they became fast friends
but once the Stylers signed the lease on her house,
the relationship quickly changed and went downhill.
- JOYCE: Nancy Pfister would say things like,
"Bring me my champagne, darling,"
or "Rub my feet, darling," or "Rub my neck, darling."
And she would say this to both Nancy Styler and Trey Styler.
And, Nancy Styler also said
that Nancy Pfister would walk around the house nude,
in front of her husband. And that didn't sit well.
So, Trey Styler told his wife, "Just be patient,
"she's gonna be leaving in a few weeks,
we can put up with her for a little bit longer."
But you could tell, it was getting to Nancy Styler.
- LISA: She was very forthcoming in her dislike
for Nancy Pfister.
Now, hating someone doesn't mean you kill them,
but it's always interesting when law enforcement
talks to someone, and that someone is saying,
very openly, how much they don't like the deceased.
- NARRATOR: When detectives press Nancy Styler
about their whereabouts the past week,
she claims she and her husband hadn't seen Nancy Pfister
since she returned from Australia.
- Nancy Styler said that the last time
they'd been to Nancy Pfister's house
was to move their belongings out,
'cause they didn't want to see Nancy Pfister
once she returned from her trip.
Once Nancy returned from her trip,
they didn't have access to the house,
so they couldn't have been there
when Nancy Pfister was killed.
- NARRATOR: In another interrogation room,
Trey Styler echoes his wife's alibi.
- BETH KRULEWICH: Mr. Styler had run into
some severe difficulties in his life,
career wise, financially.
I don't think Nancy brought in much money, as I recall.
They ended up in pretty dire financial straits.
And they were trying to rebuild their life up here.
- NARRATOR: Sensing their suspicions,
Trey quickly points out his physical ailments to police.
- He had to leave his medical profession
because he could no longer physically meet the demands
of his job in the operating room by standing.
By this point, law enforcement knows,
"Hm, whoever this killer was,
flipped a big, bulky, heavy, king sized mattress."
Whoever the killer or killers was, moved a body.
They're thinking there needs to be some strength there,
some stature there.
That's kind of hard to do on your own.
So, Trey and Nancy Styler, no evidence to hold them,
no evidence they committed any type of crime,
they're released, and they go back down to Basalt,
to their motel room, where they sit.
We had had a deputy sitting, watching that room.
- NARRATOR: The following day, police receive a call
from a sanitation worker in Basalt,
who believes he has just made a crucial discovery.
- That Friday, one of the workers
whose job was to pick up the recyclable material
went into one of these dumpsters where the material was,
and there were very strict rules
that you cannot put personal trash in there.
He saw a bag that appeared to be personal trash,
he was annoyed, he opened it up.
- LISA: What was remarkable about that trash bag,
is in it had prescription medication bottles
with the name of Nancy Pfister.
In this small valley, in this small community,
the gentleman that checked on that,
immediately knew he had come across something
that might be of interest to law enforcement.
- NARRATOR: When investigators arrive,
they collect several more valuable pieces of evidence.
- A document that was of extreme interest
that was found in this trash bag,
was a vehicle registration belonging to none other than
William Trey Styler, uh and his vehicle.
And then we found the bloody hammer.
- This was the first evidentiary connection
between one of the Stylers and a piece of evidence
in the murder itself.
- NARRATOR: The evidence is a huge break for investigators,
especially when they realize where it was found.
- LISA: Maybe 200 yards from a certain hotel
that was of interest to law enforcement,
because that hotel, this modest hotel in Basalt, Colorado,
contained Trey and Nancy Styler.
- NARRATOR: While investigators
are waiting for forensic results,
the hotel's owner makes another key discovery
outside the Styler's room.
- LISA: He does a morning check,
checking to see just if everything's alright,
if anything needs to be tidied up.
In a matter of a few feet from the motel room door
of Trey and Nancy Styler,
it's a key, and on that key,
it had a tag, and on that tag,
it was written, "Owner's closet."
It's the key to the closet
where Nancy Pfister's body was found.
- NARRATOR: The discovery is a game changer.
And when the DNA results on the potential murder weapon
come back from the crime lab,
the case against the Stylers is seemingly solidified.
- STEPHEN: The blood on the hammer,
through DNA testing, proved to be connected to Trey Styler.
Both the physical evidence, which had come out of that bag,
and Kathy Carpenter's statements about all the conflict
that was going on,
led the police to feel that they had probable cause
to make an arrest.
- NARRATOR: Coming up,
as investigators build their case,
a shocking revelation suggest the Stylers
might not be the real killers after all.
- LISA: Now we're having discussions,
"Did the Stylers really do this?
Or are the Stylers being set up?"
- BETH: That was just another indication to me
that the Stylers were being framed.
- NARRATOR: In Aspen, Colorado, authorities have arrested
married couple Trey and Nancy Styler
for the murder of their former friend
and local celebrity, Nancy Pfister.
News of the arrest stuns the close-knit community.
- JIMMY: I couldn't believe it.
When I was there, they were all having fun together,
laughing, joking, hugging each other,
toasting a drink.
I was shocked when I first heard it.
- NARRATOR: As investigators continue building their case
against the Stylers, they struggle to comprehend
the killer's carelessness with the evidence.
- STEPHEN: It just raises this fundamental question,
if that's a key piece of evidence
that would tie you into a murder,
why would you leave it 20 steps away from the door
of where you're staying at the motel?
- LISA: Now we're having discussions,
"Did the Stylers really do this?"
Or are the Stylers being set up?"
- NARRATOR: Investigators start looking at the possibility
that the Stylers are being framed.
Or that someone else may be in on it,
and is planting evidence to pin the murder
exclusively on Nancy and Trey.
But who would have the motive and the opportunity?
- BETH: One of the crucial pieces of evidence
was that there was a key to the closet
that was found very close to the Styler's motel room.
- This was the key to the owner's closet that was missing.
- BETH: But when it was tested,
they were looking to see who had touched that key,
it was Kathy Carpenter who had some forensic type evidence
on that key.
She had, obviously, access to that key.
That was the biggest fact that made me start to think
that maybe the Stylers were being framed
by Kathy Carpenter.
- NARRATOR: Investigators decide to revisit
Kathy's statements to police.
They begin by examining her 911 call.
- JASON: Kathy said in her 911 call
that there was blood all over the body
and that when she opened the closet door,
she was able to see that it was Nancy Pfister.
- JASON: The problem with that was,
that investigators, when they arrived on scene,
couldn't see any blood on the body,
and in fact, had to unwrap the body
from the garbage bags and the sheets
in order to see any blood at all.
- LISA: If you took a look at the crime scene photos,
you couldn't tell if it was a man,
if it was a woman,
all you could see was a little bit of white skin,
and you saw sheets.
Her head had been concealed, actually sealed up
in another trash bag.
There was nothing to indicate any identity of this person.
- NARRATOR: Detectives realize Kathy had also been quick
to push suspicion toward the Stylers
when she was interviewed by police.
- LISA: Kathy Carpenter
immediately mentioned the Stylers.
The Stylers were delivered to us
on this platter of people that we should be interested in.
- NARRATOR: Investigators speak with Nancy Pfister's friends
to discuss her relationship with Kathy Carpenter.
They learn Kathy had become increasingly bitter
about her seven-year friendship with Nancy Pfister.
- BETH: Nancy Pfister always wanted to be a little bit above
these people that she had around her.
They didn't seem to be relationships of equals.
So, there was some indication that maybe Nancy Pfister
didn't always treat her that well,
and there was some animosity.
- TERESA: One time we're sitting on the sofa, chatting,
and she's like, "Kathy!" She screamed for Kathy,
who was downstairs, and said,
"We ran out of Prosecco!
Go get us some more Prosecco, we ran out."
And all of the sudden you hear a car
peeling out of that gravel driveway
as fast as it could.
Kathy was angry, she was tired of being pushed around,
but she was pushed around an awful lot.
"Get me this. Get me that."
- NARRATOR: Friends also reveal that Kathy had become
close with the Stylers while Nancy was traveling overseas.
- JASON: Part of Kathy's job
was to take care of Nancy Pfister's house,
so she was over there all the time,
and while she was over there,
she got to know the Stylers,
and started spending some personal time with them.
- JOYCE: They got to know each other,
and they got to share their grievances
about Nancy Pfister.
- JASON: Investigators began hearing more and more stories
about the Stylers and Kathy Carpenter
hanging around town and openly badmouthing Nancy Pfister.
- NARRATOR: On March 1st, police decide to bring Kathy in
for another round of questioning.
They press her about the inconsistencies in her 911 call
and previous statements.
- LISA: Kathy Carpenter, her interview with us
sticks to, "Hey, I knew that was my friend."
"How did you know that was your friend?"
is what we ask her as law enforcement investigators,
and at one point in the interview,
she actually reaches up to her own head,
and she said, "It's the hair, it's the hair,"
and she starts stroking, "I recognized her blonde hair."
There was no hair free flowing
from underneath this sealed bag that was actually,
literally tied around the neck of Nancy Pfister.
- NARRATOR: Still, Kathy refuses to implicate herself.
- NARRATOR: Despite her claims of innocence,
authorities believe they have enough
circumstantial evidence against Kathy.
11 days after the Stylers were taken into custody,
Kathy Carpenter is the third person
arrested and charged with Nancy Pfister's murder.
- RITA: When she got arrested with the Stylers,
I was really surprised that she was involved.
- JIMMY: When I first heard about it,
I couldn't believe it. Like, "Holy moly,
what the hell did Kathy do?"
- NARRATOR: Coming up,
an unexpected confession threatens to upend the case,
leading to more questions, theories, and doubts
about what really happened to Nancy Pfister.
- LISA: This was a resolution
that was distasteful and disgusting to me as a cop.
- It was so shocking that they could lie to that extent.
- NARRATOR: In the winter of 2014,
law enforcement in Aspen, Colorado
have indicted three people
for the murder of celebrated socialite Nancy Pfister:
her former close friends and tenants,
Nancy and Trey Styler--
and her longtime assistant and friend, Kathy Carpenter.
As the first preliminary hearing approaches,
prosecutors solidify their theory for motive.
- LISA: Kathy Carpenter being a follower,
needing somebody to show her attention,
she found that in the Stylers.
And they bonded over their mutual hatred of Nancy Pfister.
We believe that the Stylers were the driving force.
Stylers lost everything, they had nowhere to go,
they were desperate, they were lost,
they just didn't know what to do,
and what desperate people do sometimes is lash out.
- NARRATOR: Then,
one week before the preliminary hearing is scheduled,
Trey Styler makes an unexpected plea.
- Trey Styler contacts, through his lawyer,
the prosecution team, and says,
"I wanna...I wanna talk to you."
So, they bring him in, they bring him in his wheelchair,
and he tells them, "I did this,
I did it all by myself."
- NARRATOR: According to Trey Styler,
on the morning of February 25th,
he went to Nancy Pfister's house to try and talk with her
about the escalating drama.
- Trey admits to police that he still had a key to the house,
so he lets himself in.
- He goes up the stairs, he doesn't hear anything there,
he goes into Nancy Pfister's bedroom,
he walks in the door, he sees her sleeping in her bed,
she has on her eye mask and her earplugs,
which is what she was known for,
and she's just lying there in front of him.
- BETH: He said he saw her there sleeping
and he just felt this rage, and he,
he crushed her head with a hammer.
- NARRATOR: After Trey was sure Nancy Pfister was dead,
he tells investigators how he cleaned up his crime.
- He said he and he alone moved her body to the floor.
He said he and he alone dragged her body to the closet,
wrapped her in sheets.
He said he and he alone flipped the mattress.
- Investigators heard his story, but they weren't buying it.
They did not believe that he could have acted on his own.
- JOYCE: He was always in a wheelchair,
so it was always a question of how much
could he actually move, stand, you know, lift?
And when asked about committing that crime,
he just said,
"Well, I can only attribute it to the adrenaline effect."
- NARRATOR: In exchange for his cooperation,
Trey asks authorities to drop the charges
against his wife Nancy and Kathy Carpenter.
- LISA: I sat in that interview room
just not believing Trey Styler.
He was throwing himself on the sword,
he was taking the rap so Nancy could go free.
He was also telling us Kathy Carpenter
had no involvement in this at all.
- From my review of the evidence,
I just didn't see anything
that suggested that Nancy Styler had anything to do with it.
- NARRATOR: Without any physical evidence
to disprove his story,
authorities know they won't have a foolproof case
against Nancy Styler or Kathy Carpenter.
- JOYCE: After Trey Styler had confessed to the murder,
Nancy Styler and Kathy Carpenter were basically let off.
You know, Nancy Styler was let off with prejudice,
which means that she could never be charged with the case again.
Kathy Carpenter, on the other hand,
was released without prejudice,
in legal terms meaning that she was still
under the umbrella of suspicion.
- NARRATOR: On June 20th, 2014, Trey Styler pleads guilty
to second-degree murder inside a packed Aspen courtroom.
He's sentenced to 20 years in prison.
While justice is served in the case against Trey Styler,
not everyone agrees with the district attorney's decision.
- I would not have signed on to participate
in the arrest of Trey and Nancy Styler
if I didn't believe both were part
of committing the murder of Nancy Pfister.
I wholeheartedly believed when I signed on
to participate in the arrest and be part of it,
that Kathy Carpenter was involved in the murder
of Nancy Pfister.
This was a resolution
that was distasteful and disgusting to me as a cop,
but at least we were holding someone accountable.
Everybody could've gone free.
- NARRATOR: Following his incarceration,
Trey Styler agrees to sit down with a book author
and describes how he committed the murder
despite his medical condition.
- NARRATOR: In his interview,
Trey also reiterates his wife's innocence.
- NARRATOR: In August 2015,
barely a year after his guilty plea,
Trey kills himself in his prison cell.
- He hung himself in his cell,
hung himself to death.
- JIMMY: He took the easy way out,
and I'd rather see him rot in prison, you know?
He should suffer.
- NARRATOR: As for Nancy Styler and Kathy Carpenter,
they both still vehemently maintain their innocence.
- In my heart, I did not believe she had anything
to do with this murder.
Nancy loved her husband, it completely blew her mind
that this man that she was married to
was capable of this kind of an act.
- NARRATOR: Today, there's still a strong feeling
in the Aspen community that the case
may never be fully resolved.
- STEPHAN: In the aftermath of the crime,
there was a lot of anger in Aspen
among people we interviewed, among people we talked to,
who absolutely felt that justice had not been done
for Nancy Pfister.
- JIMMY: The town of Aspen loved Nancy Pfister, okay?
She was iconic,
she lived her life the way she wanted to live it.
She had fun.
And she had fun a lot.
And she shared her good fortune and her friendship
with all of her friends.
She was too young to pass,
she had too much life left in her.
We just pray to god it never happens to anyone else again.
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