Samantha Valenzuela was 20 years old when her life changed forever.
“We hadn’t heard from her, and we’re, like, trying to call, and it’s going straight to voicemail,” she told Dateline.
Samantha was trying to get in touch with her sister Melissa Mason. The 27-year-old was eight weeks pregnant and living with her best friend, Nicole Glass, also 27.
“We’re like, ‘Maybe her phone’s dead,’” she recalled. “And then my cousin called me and he’s like, ‘I don’t want you to freak out, but my dad saw something on the news.’”
The report aired on December 3, 2010. It said that two women had been found dead inside a Phoenix, Arizona home.
Nicole’s mother, Rachel Glass, told Dateline she remembers watching a similar report. “One of her friends had called me,” she said. “She was screaming to me, ‘Rachel, turn on the TV. I think Nicole and Melissa are dead inside.’”
They were. Both women had been murdered.
Rachel told Dateline that Nicole was born in Los Angeles but they moved to Arizona when she was in the 6th grade. “It’s actually so beautiful here, especially during the winter,” Rachel said. “There’s places to go, people to see, things to do. It’s absolutely gorgeous.”
Nicole was the oldest of two. “She was a handful,” Rachel said, laughing. “She was a little horse woman. We had horses, and so she learned to ride like the wind.”
Nicole and her sister, Jessica, were five years apart, but Rachel said they couldn’t have been closer. “Very close to the point of driving me crazy,” she said. “But they would also fight like crazy. It was like -- sisters.”
In 2010, Nicole was studying communications at the University of Phoenix. “She liked doing PR. She would have been really good at sales, too,” Rachel said.
Rachel told Dateline that Nicole met Melissa five years prior to the murders. “They were bartenders together and they became best friends,” she said.
Rachel remembers Melissa fondly. “She was such a sweet little doll,” she said. “That’s what kills me, like, how could this happen?”
Melissa Mason was born and raised in Tucson, Arizona. She was the oldest of four girls. “We’re just really family-oriented,” Samantha Valenzuela told Dateline. “We were all kind of homebodies, so we spent most of our time at home.”
Samantha told Dateline that she and Melissa were extremely tight-knit. “We just enjoyed each other’s presence,” she said. “She introduced me to a lot of music, obviously, with her being seven years older than me. She introduced me to makeup.”
“She was very goofy, loyal, sometimes a little bit of an airhead,” Samantha said, laughing. “I always said she reminded me of Reese Witherspoon’s character in ‘Legally Blonde’ because she’s very book smart but also a little ditzy.”
Samantha said her sister was always the one person she wanted to be around. “Just her aura and presence would make you feel at ease,” she said.
And Melissa felt the same way about her little sister. In fact, Samantha was the only member of the family she told she was pregnant. “It was about a week before it all happened,” Melissa recalled. “She would just make subtle comments like, ‘Yeah, I’m eating for two’ or ‘I’m so hungry I can eat for two.’”
Samantha began to get the hints. “I’m like, ‘Ma’am, are you pregnant?’” she recalled. “She laughed and she didn’t confirm or deny anything. And then a couple of days later, she told me that she was pregnant.”
Samantha told Dateline that the father of the child was Melissa’s boyfriend at the time. She said the family first met him at Thanksgiving dinner that year. “He was cool. That same night after dinner, we went to the movie theatres, and we went to go watch Harry Potter,” she recalled. “He was very easy to talk to, kind of similar to my sister.”
Melissa was extremely happy to be a mother, Samantha said. “She was so excited. I mean, nervous as anyone that’s going to be pregnant for the first time, but yeah, she was very excited.” And Samantha was excited to be an aunt, too. “From there, we were just talking about my future niece or nephew and how much I was going to spoil them.”
Samantha told Dateline that Melissa had planned to tell their mother she was pregnant on Christmas Day -- a day that would never come for Melissa.
Samantha remembers the last time she spoke to her sister. “It was Wednesday, and I was going Christmas shopping and I was talking about, ‘I know it’s early, but can I get this for the baby?’” Samantha recalled. “Then we made plans for her to come down that Friday to Tucson to take family pictures with Santa Claus.”
Friday, December 3, 2010 — the day Melissa and Nicole were found dead.
Rachel Glass told Dateline that she was supposed to go over to her daughter Nicole’s house that Friday. She said the two made plans to see each other a few days earlier. “She asked me to come over and load a printer for her,” she said. “I was too tired to come to her house that day and I’m glad I didn’t -- because I would have found her.”
“I got that call at about 5:20 p.m.,” Rachel said. It was a friend, telling her to turn on the TV news. “And about 5:25 p.m., I jumped in my car and headed to [Nicole’s] house.” Rachel told Dateline she lived about an hour away from her daughter, and on the way “asked the police if they were at her house and they said, ‘Well, ma’am, we can’t tell you that.’ And I thought, ‘Oh, God. You’re there.’”
The Phoenix Police Department was there — trying to figure out what had happened at that house.
The Phoenix Police Department has put Nicole and Melissa’s cases on a cold case deck in partnership with Silent Witness. According to the deck, “on the afternoon of December 3rd, 2010, police in Phoenix, Arizona found the bodies of friends Melissa Mason and Nicole Glass, both 27, in the home they shared. Both women, who were killed in different parts of the house, had been strangled. What’s more, Melissa was eight weeks pregnant. Investigators quickly exhausted forensic leads and have yet to arrive at a motive for the triple homicide more than a decade later.”
Samantha told Dateline that her sister’s boyfriend was the one to call the family and confirm the news of Melissa’s death. “After he told me, he asked to speak to my mom,” she recalled. “Before I handed the phone to my mom, I let her know. I just felt like it would be better coming from me.”
She said she also had to tell her mother something else. Something that would tear her apart even more. “I also let her know at that time that Melissa was pregnant, just because I didn’t want her to find out from the coroner or anyone else,” she said, tearfully. “Just the screams of my mom yelling, ‘No… ‘”
Samantha told Dateline that although she has her theories, she doesn’t know who would want to kill her sister and Nicole. “Investigators always go to boyfriends -- husbands first -- especially since my sister was pregnant. So they heavily interviewed, gave a lie detector test, all of that to [her boyfriend] to see if he had any involvement,” she said. “But I believe that my sister was collateral damage. Wrong place, wrong time.”
Samantha said that Melissa’s boyfriend had kept in contact with them in the years following her sister’s death. “I know that he reached out to my mom every once in a while,” she said. “He’s been very respectful. He checks in, sees if we need anything.”
Rachel Glass told Dateline that she doesn’t know who would want to harm the women, either. She said she’s still hoping for justice for her daughter, although she isn’t sure she’ll ever get it. “I have to keep moving forward and doing anything and everything I can to bring attention to this case,” she said. “But [the police] don’t have anything.”
Samantha said she’s hoping for justice, too, but believes the case needs fresh eyes to get it. “We need someone that is going to look at this case and have a fire lit in them.”
Phoenix Police Department Sergeant Brian Bower told Dateline in an email that numerous pieces of evidence were collected at the scene including cell phones, clothing, a sexual assault kit and fingerprints. The sergeant added that there was no sign of forced entry at the home.
“Investigators questioned all of victims’ acquaintances and any subjects found during the investigation,” he wrote. “There were several investigative leads but no evidence to date to support moving forward with prosecution.”
Sergeant Bower told Dateline that the most difficult part in solving the case has been the lack of evidence. “Without additional evidence [or a ] confession this case will be very difficult to prosecute,” he said. “We always hold out hope and with advancing technology we are encouraged that cold cases will be solved.”
Meanwhile, Samantha said she’ll try to continue to move forward with her life — still thinking about her sister every day. “When I turned 27, that was really hard because I started feeling survivor guilt, like, ‘How come I get to live longer than my sister ever did?’” she said, tearfully. “Every time I get pregnant, I just think of -- my sister never got to experience this in life, and that’s not fair.”
Rachel told Dateline she’s missed out on key moments of her daughter Nicole’s life, as well. “She’d probably be married with a couple of kids,” she said. “And have a profession — she worked her butt off.”
Rachel and Samantha will never get to see what may have been for Nicole and Melissa. But Samantha believes both of the women are at peace now. “It’s just us here on Earth that are still heartbroken,” she said.
A reward of up to $8,700 is being offered by Silent Witness for information leading to the arrest and/or indictment of the suspect(s) in the case.
Anyone with information about the murders of Nicole Glass and Melissa Mason is asked to call the Phoenix Police Department at 602-262-6151.