by John Glatt
Then Greenwald asked the judge for a special hearing to determine if Narcy Novack could use assets currently tied up in Florida probate court to pay his fees. He explained how the $200,000 worth of jewelry he had brought to court had recently come to light through a family member.
“The taxpayers have been paying for Miss Novack,” Karas told Greenwald angrily, “and the taxpayers should be reimbursed for Mr. Tanner’s hard work. You have a retainer. Now all of a sudden there’s jewelry to pay for it.”
Then Tanner told the judge that his client wanted to address the court, although he’d warned her not to.
“I’m going to echo that advice,” said the judge. “What Mr. Greenwald has said in this court could hurt your cause in ways you don’t even think.”
Ignoring him, Narcy got to her feet and declared, “I’m tired of this. I’m fighting corruption. I’ve been framed.”
“We’re not here to try your case,” the judge told her.
“Please let me use my wedding band to defend myself,” she said. “Because the Florida court has used my assets to pay my accuser’s lawyers’ bills. I can’t use my own [money.]”
“You told me in a sworn statement that you had nothing to pay an attorney,” Karas told her sternly. “Now you’re telling me you want to use [jewelry].
“After I find out later that I have this,” she snapped. “Please let me use my assets, so I can use Mr. Greenwald to defend myself. I need more than what I have.”
“I can answer that in one word,” the judge told her sternly. “No.”
Judge Karas then denied Greenwald’s request for a hearing, saying Narcy Novack already had a court-appointed attorney. “She just wants to have her proverbial cake and eat it,” said the judge. “She has no right to multiple counsel. I will leave it to the government as to what it wants to do with the jewels. The application is denied.”
Judge Karas then called a short recess, leaving Narcy and her brother Cristobal alone in the courtroom except for two marshals and a couple of reporters.
“Bastards!” Narcy hissed at her brother, sitting behind her. Then she turned around to the press bench, grinned, and said, “Happy Halloween.”
When the court reconvened, Judge Karas told Veliz he was denying his request to marry Laura Law, as it posed too many security problems.
“He’s just going to have to wait,” said the judge.
* * *
Two days later the government named Ben Novack’s secret mistress in a sensational motion. It asked Judge Karas to allow the jury to hear about the Novacks’ 2002 home invasion, claiming it established “a sick, vicious cycle” leading to the two murders.
It also revealed that, before his death, Ben had been supporting one-time exotic dancer and tattoo artist Rebecca Bliss in an apartment in Fort Lauderdale. After discovering the affair in the summer of 2008, the motion claimed, a furious Narcy telephoned the landlord and ordered him to terminate the lease, as her husband was dead and there would be no further payments.
Then she had then gone to the FBI and accused Ben of arranging sham marriages, with Bliss being one of the unlawful brides. A month later, Narcy notified Mexican customs officials that her husband had smuggled $10,000 in currency into Mexico.
The motion contended that after the FBI failed to act, Narcy and her brother Cristobal began hatching the plan to murder Bernice and Ben Novack.
* * *
Ten days later, an all-day pretrial hearing was held to rule on a defense motion that Narcy Novack’s seven-hour videotaped police interview should be inadmissible. Senior investigator Edward Murphy testified that Narcy Novack had fully cooperated with law enforcement after her husband’s murder.
He admitted, however, under Howard Tanner’s questioning, that she had not been informed that the interview was being videotaped.
“We chose not to tell her,” he said. “She was not a suspect.”
After a lunch recess, Narcy Novack dramatically took the stand. Wearing a Westchester County Correctional Center standard orange jumpsuit, her graying brown hair in a ponytail, she was sworn into the witness box.
She told her attorney Howard Tanner that she had been suicidal in the hours after Ben’s murder. “There was a uniformed police officer with a gun on his belt,” she said. “I tried to grab the gun. My husband was gone and there was nothing I could do for him.”
Narcy claimed that all her statements after her husband’s murder were coerced, as she had been told that her questioning was a normal procedure she had to follow. She also maintained that initially she had refused to take a lie detector test, but had been intimidated into it by detectives.
“They asked me to sign [the polygraph test forms],” she told Judge Karas. “I said, ‘No, I’m tired.’ Then they locked me in the polygraph room and left me for twenty minutes. They came back with May Abad and said she had taken hers and passed and was free to go. [I took it] because I just wanted to be clean and recover the body and do what I wanted to do.”
Narcy said that after failing the polygraph test, the detectives’ attitude to her changed drastically. “The detective came over and he was screaming at me and calling me names,” she claimed. “I said, ‘Let me sleep for a couple of hours … either arrest me now or let me call a lawyer. Then May Abad entered the polygraph room and she was going to hit me. One of the [detectives] grabbed her, saying, ‘Leave her, we’re going to get her ass.’”
In cross-examination, Elliott Jacobson asked Novack if all the statements she had made to investigators were involuntary.
“I did not care to answer to anyone,” she snapped. “I wanted to be left alone.”
At the end of the daylong hearing, Cristobal Veliz took the stand and claimed that Detective Murphy and Detective Sergeant Terence Wilson had entered and searched his apartment without his permission. During his testimony, Narcy’s brother baffled the courtroom by insisting that the “Ed Murphy” who had questioned him was not the same “Ed Murphy” who had testified earlier.
“I have never seen him before in my life,” Veliz told the judge in a thick accent.
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.
FIFTY-TWO
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.”
Perron
e 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.”
