The Prince of Paradise (45 page)

Under his attorney Larry Sheehan’s questioning, Veliz said four investigators had entered his Philadelphia apartment and woken him up.
He said he thought he was under attack and had gotten a knife to defend himself.
Veliz also claimed that there had been no papers whatsoever on his kitchen table and a detective had opened his briefcase while he was changing in the bedroom, and had found the Western Union wire transfer.

Veliz also claimed that a detective had later asked him if he suffered from hemorrhoids, after seeing a box of Preparation H, which had also been inside the briefcase.

“Could you see the Preparation H without opening up the briefcase?”
Sheehan asked.

“Impossible,” Veliz replied.

“Was there anything on that table when they went into the apartment?”
the lawyer asked.

“No,” Veliz said.

Before dismissing Veliz from the stand, a confused Judge Karas asked him if Detective Edward Murphy had come to his apartment.

“Not this one,” Veliz relied resolutely.
“He looked different.”

*   *   *

On March 12 the government’s case took a major hit when it was revealed that Detective Alison Carpentier, who had since retired, had given May Abad $5,000 to enter a safe house.
Prosecutor Elliott Jacobson had written a letter to the court flagging certain issues that might arise during trial.
One of them was the question of Detective Carpentier’s loan, which was never paid back.

“Following Ben Novack’s murder,” Jacobson wrote, “Abad was increasingly isolated from her family.
[She] felt threatened by them.”

The letter also asked Judge Karas to stop the defense from showing the jury the photographs of female nude amputees found on Ben Novack’s laptop computer.
“Neither those pictures, nor evidence about them,” Jacobson wrote, “should be admitted in evidence.
Ben Novack is not on trial and whether he had such a fetish is not an appropriate issue for the jury to consider.”

Four days later, Howard Tanner wrote to Judge Karas demanding that prosecutors be ordered to produce complete details about Detective Carpentier’s loan to May Abad, and all the phone records and e-mails between the two women dating from Ben Novack’s murder onward.

“Detective Carpentier’s payment to Ms.
Abad raises substantial issues,” Tanner wrote, “of the integrity of the law enforcement investigation, which is crucial to the defense of this case.
Apparently, Detective Carpentier was the subject of an investigation and was subsequently either fired or forced to resign … a fact not revealed by the Government.”

*   *   *

On Friday, March 23, Judge Kenneth Karas ruled that Narcy Novack’s videotaped police interviews could be played for the jury only if she took the stand.
After watching the seven-hour interview and reading the complete transcript, Judge Karas said he found Narcy’s behavior more “melodramatic” than “suicidal.”
He noted that she hadn’t been arrested, restrained, or searched during the police questioning, and had repeatedly said that she knew she was free to leave but wanted to do everything to help the investigation.

“Mrs.
Novack is not a wallflower,” the judge said.
“She has a very strong personality and … a will of her own.
She appears to be chatty in discussing some remarkably intimate details.”

The judge found that Narcy’s statements, although given voluntarily, would be admissible at trial only if she testified.
Judge Karas also found that the police had acted properly in entering Cristobal Veliz’s apartment and that none of his rights had not been violated.
He said he found it “incredible” that Veliz had claimed that he had never seen Investigator Murphy before.

“It just doesn’t make sense,” Judge Karas said, and ruled that any information “gleaned” from the visit to Veliz’s apartment would be admissible at trial.

*   *   *

On Wednesday, April 11—five days before the start of her trial—Narcy Novack telephoned the
Journal News
offices and gave an exclusive jailhouse interview.

“You guys have demonized me,” she told reporter Jonathan Bandler.
“Well, now I don’t have answers at the courtroom, well, guess what?
I’m going to make this very public.
They want this to be a federal case, well, let’s have a federal case.”

Narcy then claimed that she was lucky to be alive, and had been almost murdered with her husband.
“At the last moment my plan changed,” she explained.
“For the grace of God I left the room.”

In her rambling interview, the accused murderess questioned whether the government could even prove Ben was dead.
“One of my questions is,” she asked, “is my husband alive?
And they don’t have the answer.”

Narcy also claimed her mother-in-law, Bernice Novack, had not been murdered.
“I don’t believe she was killed,” she railed.
“Not on my orders and not on anybody’s orders.
That did not happen.”

Then she attacked the prosecutors for being corrupt and setting her up.
“They can lock me in Valhalla,” she declared, “but you know the truth will come out, because I’m going to expose these rat bastards.
And believe me they’re going to regret this.”

*   *   *

On Monday, April 16, the day before jury selection, the defense scored a major victory when Judge Karas ruled that the contentious 2002 home invasion incident would be inadmissible at trial.
But the jury would be allowed to hear Narcy Novack’s statements to Fort Lauderdale Police describing her marriage as a “sick, vicious cycle” and saying she had left Ben as many as sixty times.
The jury also could not be told that Narcy Novack had repeatedly failed a polygraph test, as it would be unfairly prejudicial.

During this final pretrial hearing, Narcy insisted on addressing the court several times, despite warnings from the judge and her attorney not to do so.
Now she wanted the judge to postpone the trial so she could be better prepared for it.

“Enough already,” she told Judge Karas.
“I’m fed up.
Put on hold everything … so I can have a proper defense.
Let’s wait for two or three months until I’m comfortable.
I’m not ready to fight for my life, [and] you’re just rushing me.”

Judge Karas denied her request, expressing surprise that she now wanted to delay the trial after having made “abundantly clear” her frustration at the slow pace of the proceedings.

Then prosecutor Elliott Jacobson read out portions of Narcy Novack’s recent interview with the
Journal News
, accusing her of criminally threatening federal prosecutors.

“The federal government has eyes and ears,” he warned Narcy.
“We’re not talking about some small police department in Podunk.
If there’s any attempt to intimidate us there will be hell to pay.”

After lunch, Tanner told the judge that, as a protest, his client was now insisting on wearing bright orange Westchester County Correctional Center scrubs at trial, although her brother Cristobal would wear civilian clothes.

“Her position is her clothing has been seized and is not available,” Tanner explained.
“She has no idea what type of clothes [will] be given to her.”

Once again, against Tanner’s advice, Narcy insisted on addressing the court.

“Why sugarcoat?”
she asked.
“They have turned my life inside out, upside down.
[I’m] an innocent widow and I want people to know.
The world needs to be educated.
I’m not going to be made a puppet and have them dress me from Kmart.”

After reading of her mother’s intention to wear standard jail uniform at trial, May Abad offered through her attorney to personally select clothes from Narcy’s wardrobe, and send them to her mother.

F
IFTY-
T
WO

THE TRIAL

On Tuesday, April 17, fifty prospective jurors filed into Judge Karas’s fifth-floor courtroom to see if they could be fair and impartial in the wake of the enormous publicity the case had generated.
After being questioned one by one by the judge and attorneys from both sides, most claimed to be unaware of any details of the case.

On Wednesday morning, more potential jurors were examined, and by 11:45, the no-nonsense judge had selected eight men and four women jurors, along with six alternates.

After the jurors were dismissed until opening statements the following Monday, Judge Karas ordered Narcy Novack to stop the “name-calling.”

The unrepentant defendant apologized for calling the prosecutors “rat bastards,” explaining her remarks had been directed solely at the Rye Brook Police Department.

“They did me wrong,” she explained, “and I will always be mad at them.
There’s no sugarcoating it.
Mr.
Jacobson is dealing with tainted information.”

As Judge Karas warned her to remain quiet during the trial, Narcy began to try to explain herself.

“You will not interrupt me, ever!”
the judge told her angrily.
“It’s not my job to be your lawyer … I don’t think it’s helpful for you to make these statements, but that’s for you to figure out.”

*   *   *

At 9:30
A.M
.
on Monday, April 23, as Narcy Novack and Cristobal Veliz were brought into the U.S.
District Courthouse for the first day of their trial, a nor’easter was raging outside.
As promised, Narcy wore standard-issue orange jail scrubs, with her graying hair tied in a ponytail.
Her brother Cristobal had a crumpled off-white shirt with a vest underneath, which he would wear for the next month.
Although he spoke good English, Veliz requested a Spanish-language interpreter for the duration of the trial.

At 10:00
A.M.
the twelve jurors and six alternates entered courtroom 521, taking their seats in the jury box.
Then special assistant U.S.
attorney Perry Perrone stood up to deliver the government’s opening statements.

“Cut his eyes!
Break her teeth!”
he began.
“Words from a script to a grade-B horror movie?
Nope.
You will hear that on July twelfth, 2009.
For Ben Novack and his mother, Bernice, these actions would become a gruesome reality.”

The tall, youthful prosecutor told the jury that “these horrible acts” had been carefully orchestrated by Narcy Novack and her older brother, and the motive was “jealousy, retribution and greed.”

Perrone explained how Ben Novack Jr.
was having an affair with an “exotic dancer” called Rebecca Bliss, and Narcy feared he would divorce her, cutting her off from his multimillion-dollar fortune.

After failing to buy off Bliss, Narcy had gone to the FBI and accused her husband of arranging sham marriages, and named Bliss as one of the brides.
When the FBI failed to act, she enlisted her brother Cristobal to hire “savages” to assault first Bernice Novack and then her son.

“They’re not nice guys,” the bespectacled prosecutor acknowledged.
“Their actions are horrible.
But Narcy Novack and Cristobal Veliz chose them for that reason.
They made them witnesses in this case.”

Winding up his ninety-five-minute opening argument, Perrone told the jury it was “a very complex case,” but they would find “overwhelming proof” that the two defendants were guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Then Cristobal Veliz’s attorney, Larry Sheehan, told the jury that the killers, Alejandro Garcia and Joel Gonzalez, would say anything to save their skins.
“The government makes deals with the devil,” said Sheehan.
“What kind of man hits someone with barbells and then cuts his eyes out?”

He said that in federal court, the only way out of prison is in a pine box.
“They will say anything to get out,” he said.
“It’s a get-out-of-jail-free card.”

Sheehan then accused May Abad of not only hiring the two killers, but also of kidnapping and torturing his client before threatening to kill his grandchildren.
He told jurors that “wild horses” could not stop Cristobal Veliz taking the stand in his defense.

In his opening statement, Howard Tanner accused the Rye Brook Police Department of being “inexperienced” and of immediately focusing on Narcy Novack like “a laser beam.”
“From the moment Ben Novack’s body was discovered by his wife,” said Tanner, “the fingers started pointing at my client.
Whispers in the ears of detectives by May Abad.
It soon turned into a tainted investigation.”

Tanner accused Detective Alison Carpentier of compromising the whole murder investigation by giving money to a person of interest.
“She gave May five thousand dollars in cash,” Tanner told the jury, “and deposited it in her bank account.
Even after she was taken off the case, Alison Carpentier gave her [another] gift months later.
May Abad never paid her back.”

He acknowledged that Ben and Narcy Novack had an unconventional marriage, as jurors listened in rapt attention.
“We’re going to get to the amputee sex,” he told them.
“We’re going to get to the deviant sex.
This is not about whether this was a normal marriage.
But the fact remains it worked for them.”

Tanner said the only evidence against his client came from “two lying monsters,” and that everything that had happened inside the Woodlands Suite at the Rye Town Hilton was uncorroborated.

“Narcy Novack was not in the hotel room,” he declared.
“She had absolutely nothing to do with Ben or Bernice Novack’s deaths.”

*   *   *

After a brief recess, the government called its first witness, now-retired Fort Lauderdale Police Department detective Steve Palazzo.
Although the jury could hear nothing about the 2002 home invasion, Palazzo was able to describe how Narcy Novack had brought her husband’s photo collection of naked female amputees into police headquarters.

“Did she show you any of them?”
prosecutor Elliott Jacobson asked.

“Yes,” replied Palazzo.
“She told me she wanted to bring to my attention photos that would show the unusual sexual desires of her husband.
There were real old photos and magazines.
Some of the women were undressed and missing limbs.
She said they were into bondage and he was into fantasies about having sex with amputees.”

Palazzo said Narcy had described hers and Ben’s marriage as “a sick, vicious cycle,” saying she had walked out on him on many occasions.

Then Howard Tanner asked if some of the photographs had been Polaroids, intimating that they had been taken by Ben Novack himself.

“They may have been,” he replied.

That night,
The Miami Herald
’s Julie Brown asked May Abad her feelings about the prosecution strategy of accusing her of masterminding the killings.

“The whole thing is a joke,” she said.
“They are making a circus out of this.
To me, they are going to say whatever they can to save their own asses.”

*   *   *

On the second day of the trial, Ben Novack Jr.’s estate lawyer, Carl Schuster, testified that Narcy Novack would have inherited far more if her husband died than in a divorce.
The Fort Lauderdale attorney said that under the Novacks’ 1991 prenuptial agreement, Narcy would have received only $65,000 plus moving expenses in a divorce.
But under his June 2006 will, she stood to gain millions.

“Financially,” said Schuster, “she would have been better off if he was dead.”

Later that morning, federal marshals led Rebecca Bliss into court to testify about her affair with Ben Novack Jr.
The heavily tattooed former prostitute and pornstar, who was in custody in Michigan for DUI and nonpayment of child support, had been granted immunity by the government to testify.

Looking pale and haggard with her messy brown hair tied back and curls falling into her face, Bliss seemed nervous and uncomfortable.
As Bliss took the stand to be sworn in, Narcy Novack glared at her across the courtroom from the defense table.

Under assistant U.S.
attorney Andrew Dember’s direct questioning, Bliss described how in early 2008, Ben Novack Jr.
had answered her online “escort ad.”
After an exchange of e-mails and phone calls, they’d met for a two-hour sex session and he had paid her $600.

“The first date was just sexual relations,” she told the jury, “but we got a lot closer.”

In early June, she said, Novack persuaded her to give up prostitution and move from Miami to Fort Lauderdale, promising to support her and find her a place to live.
He installed her in a luxury hotel spa for two weeks while she looked for an apartment.

He then signed a lease on a luxury condo in the Marina Bay Club, a short drive away from his home, telling her to furnish it at his expense.

“He asked me not to work anymore,” she told the jury, “not to continue to escort.
He paid for all my food and utilities.”

Bliss testified that although her sugar daddy paid for everything and was very generous, she rarely saw him.
During her year there, they had sex “maybe twice.”

She told the jury they were in love, and that Ben Novack had promised to leave Narcy for her and get a divorce.

“As his girlfriend,” Bliss told jurors, “I was being very patient.”

Then, in January 2009, Bliss received a barrage of furious calls from Narcy Novack.
“She asked, did I know he was married,” Bliss testified.
“I said, yes, I did.
She told me there were a lot of other girls and I wasn’t the only one.”

She said Narcy then offered her $10,000 to break off the relationship and never talk to her husband again.
Bliss refused.

At this point, Judge Karas overruled Howard Tanner’s objection, allowing Bliss to testify that Narcy Novack had told her, “If she couldn’t have him, no other woman was going to have him.”

In an often-hostile cross-examination, Tanner ridiculed the idea of love between Bliss and Ben Novack.

“You put yourself out there as a prostitute?”
Tanner asked.

“Yes,” Bliss replied, unfazed.

“You charge three hundred dollars an hour to have sex, is that your stated price?”
he continued.

“Yes, you have to set the price the same as the other girls in Florida.
But I have limits on what I will do.”

Then, referring to the $10,000 she claimed Narcy had offered her to stop seeing Ben, Tanner questioned whether it had been enough money.
“How much would it have taken?”
he demanded to know.
“Everybody has their price.”

“I told her there wasn’t one,” Bliss replied.
At the defense table, Narcy Novack stuck a finger in her mouth, as if she were about to throw up.

On Wednesday morning, two burly marshals led Alejandro Garcia to the witness stand.
He was wearing thick black wraparound sunglasses and an Orange County, New York, jail jumpsuit.

For the next five days, through two Spanish-language interpreters, the government’s star witness would describe, without a hint of emotion, coldly killing Bernice Novack and then her son, Ben.

Under assistant U.S.
district attorney Elliott Jacobson’s questioning, Garcia told the jury that in March 2009 he’d been recruited by Melvin Medrano to assault an old woman.
Soon afterward, he said, Medrano had introduced him to Cristobal Veliz, at the Miami car wash where Garcia worked.
Jefe, as he knew him, was organizing the job for his sister Narcy Novack, and would pay him $1,000.

After several failed attempts and after drinking two bottles of rum, Garcia had sneaked up behind Bernice Novack’s car and attacked her with a monkey wrench in her garage.

“She looked at me and she screamed,” he testified.
“And right away I hit her.”

Over the next several days, he described Cristobal Veliz’s preparations for the next attack, on Ben Novack, for which Garcia would be paid $10,000.
As Medrano had been deported back to Nicaragua, Veliz had recruited Joel Gonzalez for the attack.

Garcia told the jurors that the original plan had been to castrate Ben Novack, but that had changed to cutting out his eyes.
He said Veliz told him the reason was so that Narcy could continue running Convention Concepts Unlimited, using her disabled husband’s business expertise to help her.

On Friday morning—the fifth day of the trial—jurors heard the gruesome details of the July 12, 2009, attack on Ben Novack.
Garcia described how a cell phone call from Narcy Novack had been the signal to go to the Rye Town Hilton, and how she had let them into the suite.