The Prince of Paradise (49 page)

In his cross-examination, Elliott Jacobson got Zippay to admit that even if the postnuptial agreement had been valid, as the defense claimed it had been, Narcy would have received twice as much with Ben dead than in a divorce.

“Were you paid for your service?”
Jacobson asked Zippay.

“I received an initial retainer,” Zippay replied, “but Mrs.
Novack never paid me any more money.
I received ten percent of what I was owed.”

The next defense witness was retired police detective Robert Crispin, whom Tanner had hired to try to discredit May Abad.
The private investigator testified that he was paid $5,000 to conduct six “trash pulls between November 2009 and February 2010.
He said he had waited for May Abad to put her trash out in front of her home before rifling through it.

Crispin testified that he found several shut-off warnings from the electric company and late-payment notices for Abad’s Toyota.
Then, on June 28, 2010, he found a two-page handwritten list of May’s future aspirations.
Written on notepaper adorned with butterflies and ladybugs, May’s long-term goals included: having fifteen to twenty properties within five years; moving into a five-bedroom house on the water with a pool and a small boat; and spending more time with her three sons.
She also wanted to buy a “hole in the wall bar,” as well as make $1 million by the age of forty and retiring.

“Would you agree,” Tanner asked, “the note reflects the wishes of someone who wants to become very rich?”

Prosecutor Jacobson objected, but Judge Karas allowed him to answer.

“Yes,” Crispin replied.

The private investigator also testified that he had visited 2501 Del Mar Place looking for any sunglasses with missing temple pieces.
He had found about six pairs in that condition and placed them on a small glass table to be photographed.
None of them had been Valentinos.

In his cross, Jacobson asked Crispin if he had been given specific instructions to look for a pair of Valentino sunglasses with a missing temple piece.

“I may have,” Crispin replied.

“And you didn’t find any Valentino sunglasses?”
the prosecutor asked.

“No,” he replied.

Jacobson noted that Narcy Novack had lived at the house until she was arrested in July 2010 and could easily have broken off the temple pieces.

“You have no idea if the sunglasses were accidentally broken or intentionally broken,” Jacobson asked.

“I do not,” Crispin replied.

Crispin conceded that he also did not know where or when Abad’s “Long Term Goals” note had been written, agreeing that there had been no attempt made to destroy it.

“These notes,” Jacobson asked.
“What kind of trash were they found with?”

“Food and garbage,” the investigator said.

“‘Trash pulls’—isn’t that a fancy way of saying you’re going through somebody’s trash?”

“Yes,” Crispin said.

“You have no way of knowing if the aspirations, hopes, and dream for her to have her life changed, [were written after seeing] a seminar at a convention?”

“Yes,” Crispin acknowledged.

The next defense witness was Jeremy Morris, the Rye Town Hilton manager on duty the weekend of Ben Novack’s murder.
He testified that Narcy was visibly distraught over her husband’s death.

“There was a lot of screaming and crying,” Morris told the jury.

“Would you describe her as emotionless?”
Tanner asked.

“Definitely not emotionless,” Morris replied.

During his questioning, Morris suggested that May Abad had appeared more upset with her mother’s behavior than her stepfather’s murder.

“May told her to shut up and stop it,” Morris testified, “or it was going to make her throw up.”

On Friday morning—the thirtieth day of the trial—Howard Tanner announced that Narcy Novack would not be taking the stand in her own defense.
This followed a report in
The Miami Herald
that Narcy was so furious that Detective Alison Carpentier would not be called as a defense witness that she had threatened her lawyer after court recessed on Thursday.

“My client has instructed me to put on the record that she does not wish to testify,” Tanner said.
“I met with my client … on numerous occasions to discuss this issue.
She has stated to me that she has said what she is going to say.
She continues to assert her innocence.“

Then Judge Kenneth Karas asked the defendant to verify that it was her signature on a document Tanner had just given him stating her intention not to testify.
Narcy Novack refused to answer the judge directly, going through her attorney instead.

“She has just whispered, ‘Yes, I do,’” Tanner said.

“Is the decision [not to testify] made by you of your own free will?”
the judge asked.

“Yes,” her attorney relayed to the court.

“This is for the record,” Judge Karas said.
“Mrs.
Novack has elected not to communicate with me directly and through Mr.
Tanner.”

For the rest of the trial, Narcy Novack would not utter a single word, staring straight ahead defiantly.
It was as if she no longer recognized the federal court.

*   *   *

That afternoon, Howard Tanner called Carlos Veliz’s daughter Karla to the stand.
Narcy Novack’s niece testified that she flew down to Fort Lauderdale a couple of days after Ben Novack’s murder to stay with her aunt.

“She’s a human being,” Karla said.
“I wanted to be there emotionally for her.”

Previously, Judge Karas had ruled that the jury could not hear about Fort Lauderdale Police being called to 2501 Del Mar Place, or about May Abad’s allegation that her mother had attacked her with a crowbar.
But Karla would be allowed to describe what had led up to the confrontation.

“Comes a time you had an interaction with May Abad?”
Tanner asked.

“Yes,” Karla Veliz replied, explaining that it was first time she had ever met her cousin.

“When you went into the guesthouse, what happened?”

“I saw [May] in Ben’s office,” Karla said, “and she was just leafing through the folders and files.
She kept repeating, ‘My father, my father—he has something for me.’”

In his cross-examination, Elliott Jacobson asked Karla if she was Carlos Veliz’s daughter and if Melanie Klein was like a stepmother.

“She’s my father’s partner,” Karla said.

“Are you aware that there’s been evidence that your father gave a bag of guns to Alejandro Garcia,” the prosecutor asked, “to plant in May Abad’s trunk?”

“No,” she replied.

“Are you aware that your father attempted to have Garcia maim May Abad?”

“No.”

“Are you aware your father has been implicated in racketeering?”

“No.”

In redirect, Tanner asked Karla what May Abad’s demeanor was while rifling through Ben Novack’s papers.

“She was extremely nervous,” Karla replied.
“She wanted to get in and out.
She was going through each and every folder feverishly.”

On Friday afternoon the defense rested its case after calling just eight witnesses.
The government then began its rebuttal case, and after the jury was dismissed for the weekend, Howard Tanner called for a mistrial.

“I don’t believe the government has submitted evidence of a sufficient nature to convict my client,” he declared.

“I deny the motion,” Judge Karas ruled.
“I find there is more than sufficient evidence to convict on these charges.”

F
IFTY-
F
OUR

“IF EVER THERE WAS A PLOT HATCHED IN HELL”

On Tuesday, June 12—the thirty-second day of the trial—as assistant U.S.
attorney Andrew Dember was about to deliver the government’s closing arguments, Cristobal Veliz insisted on addressing the court, against his attorney’s advice.

Speaking in fluent English, Veliz now claimed to have known everything about the plot and said that the government knew only 25 percent of it.

“If I know who the killers are,” Veliz told Judge Karas, “I can give a full explanation of what happened.
Then you can judge me.”

“Mr.
Veliz,” the judge said.
“The evidence is over.
Let the jury decide.
Have a seat.
Your testimony is done.”

Then prosecutor Dember walked over to the lectern in front of the jury to begin his closing argument.

“You’ve sat and listened over the last seven weeks to an extraordinary amount of testimony and information in this case,” he began.
“You’ve seen two different orchestrations that led to the deaths of Ben and Bernice Novack.
They hired hit men and bought people to carry out their enterprise—to punish Ben Novack for his marital indiscretion and take over his business and assets.”

Dember then began methodically laying out the evidence, likening it to large and small pieces in a jigsaw puzzle.

“Garcia and Gonzalez were the hit men,” he told the jury.
“They didn’t come into these homicides, these acts, by accident.
They were brought into this by these defendants—”

“By May Abad!”
Cristobal Veliz suddenly yelled from the defense table.

Judge Karas immediately dismissed the jury, and started reading from a U.S.
Supreme Court decision that the right of a defendant to be present in court is not absolute.
He then castigated Veliz for his behavior throughout the trial, by banging on his desk and often shouting to get his points over.

“You are not allowed to intervene,” he told Veliz.
“I expect you and everyone in this courtroom to act with sufficient respect for the system of justice.
You are not allowed outbursts.
If you can’t abide by these simple instructions, you will be placed in a pen.
Do you understand?”

“Yes, I stay quiet,” the defendant replied.

Judge Karas then brought the jury back, and Dember continued.

“Garcia and Gonzalez were hired by Mrs.
Novack and Mr.
Veliz—these people over there,” he declared, pointing at the defense tables.
“So much of the defense case is that it wasn’t them that hired the killers.
It’s May Abad.
It’s May Abad.
This is frankly incredible.”

The prosecutor told the jury that Garcia and Gonzalez were just hired hit men with absolutely no loyalty to May Abad.
“There is no relationship between [them] and May Abad,” he said.
“They don’t even know who she is.”

Sifting through all the evidence against the two defendants in both killings, Dember said the phone call that Narcy Novack made to her brother Cristobal’s “dirty phone” at 6:39
A.M
.
on July 12, 2009, was especially damning.

“It’s go time,” Dember said, “and Mr.
Veliz tells Garcia it’s time.
[The killers] didn’t rely on luck.
They didn’t knock down the door.
They didn’t drill [the lock].
They didn’t use a key card.
Narcy Novack ushers them into the room and they inflict a vicious, brutal attack on Ben Novack.”

Once again Dember led the jury through all the cell phone and credit card records, placing Cristobal Veliz at key locations at the same time as the killers.
He ridiculed Veliz’s claims that May Abad had set him up, and that Francisco Picado had used his Pathfinder, cell phone, and credit cards at critical times.

Dember then accused Veliz of distancing himself, in a calculated manner, from everyone doing his dirty work.
“It’s all a question of Cristobal Veliz trying to outsmart everyone,” the prosecutor said.

On Wednesday morning, Andrew Dember systematically picked apart Narcy Novack’s alibi for the morning of her husband’s death, saying she had made a lot of mistakes.

“[There were] real doozies,” he told the jury.
“The first one was that they had a plan to tie up Narcy and her husband, so it looked like a robbery.”
He said she had put “the kibosh” on that without thinking out the consequences.

“Narcy Novack did not have an endgame,” he said.
“She didn’t have an exit strategy about what happens next.”

Dember told the jury, Narcy could not just get into a car and drive off, or be found in the suite “unharmed and untied,” either.
Therefore, she needed an alibi.

Although she showed up at the Amway breakfast to make it look like she was helping out, all she did was park herself in front of a hotel security camera.
“She makes an appearance so she can be seen,” the prosecutor said, “so people can say, ‘Oh, I saw Narcy Novack.’”

Her big flaw was that she was visible only after the killers had left the hotel.

“It’s all after the fact,” Dember said.
“It doesn’t help her.”

At the end of his six-hour summation, Dember told the jury that there was not “a scintilla of evidence” that May Abad had had anything to do with either of the murders.

“The evidence is overwhelming against Narcy Novack and Cristobal Veliz,” he said.
“There is only one logical and natural conclusion to be drawn from the evidence in this case.
We will ask you to reach a verdict that speaks the truth—a verdict that beyond a reasonable doubt Narcy Novack and Cristobal Veliz are guilty.”

Judge Karas then called a recess, and as the U.S.
marshals were taking the defendants out of court, Cristobal Veliz suddenly shouted, “I want to change my plea!”

*   *   *

When the court reconvened an hour later, at 1:30
P.M
., Larry Sheehan clarified that his client wanted to change his plea only as it related to May Abad.
Once again Sheehan told Judge Karas that, against his advice, Veliz wished to address the court.

“I want to plead guilty,” Veliz told the judge, “and I want to speak on my behalf.
I want to tell the real truth [in English].”

He then attacked his attorney for not asking him enough questions, and working with the prosecution against him.

Judge Karas refused to allow him to change his plea, or to testify again.

“You had a chance to answer the larger questions,” Karas told him.
“To the extent you don’t think your testimony went the way you want, it’s over.”

“It’s not over!”
the defendant defiantly replied.

“It’s over,” the judge reiterated.
“The evidence is all in.
Your testimony is over.
If you can’t sit quietly there’s a place for you in the pen.”

At 1:45
P.M
., after the jury had filed back into the courtroom, Larry Sheehan walked over to the jury box to begin his closing argument.

“It’s been a long trial,” he told the jury.
“I’ve got the summation jitters.
I’ve got to tell you it’s been a long road, and you have no idea how happy I am to be here.”

For the next forty minutes, Sheehan methodically recited dozens of inconsistencies between Alejandro Garcia’s and Joel Gonzalez’s testimony.
He attacked them as “sociopaths” who would lie “at the drop of a hat.”

“They’re people without conscience,” he told the jury.
“They’re people without souls.
They can’t get their stories straight, folks, because they’re lying.
Were they testifying or testi-lying.”

Sheehan’s summation went into Thursday morning, as he suggested that May Abad had masterminded the killings.
He told the jury that it would take only a single doubt to find his client not guilty.

“Reasonable doubt begins with Garcia and ends with Gonzalez,” he declared.
“My job is now over and yours begins.
It’s time to reach a good verdict.
Please take your time and discuss it and you’ll come back with a just verdict of not guilty.”

Then Howard Tanner stepped up to the lectern for his closing argument.

“The government’s case is as flimsy as a house of cards built on a shaky foundation, based on suspicions, assumptions, hearsay, and speculation,” he told the jury.

He said the government was trying to get into his client’s head and guess at the motive.
“They’re missing facts, firsthand witnesses,” he said.
“Not people who say what they heard that Narcy Novack said.”

Tanner said the real reason prosecutors had made a deal with two sociopathic killers was because they didn’t have anything else.
Calling Garcia and Gonzalez “monsters,” he said they had lied to prosecutors, hoping to get out of prison one day.

He also questioned whether Narcy Novack had even made that crucial 6:39
A.M
.
cell phone call that set the attack in motion, saying “a phone is not a person.”

He claimed Narcy had never brought her so-called secret phone to New York, although someone else obviously had, he added, intimating that it was Narcy’s daughter, May.

“If someone wanted to make it look like Narcy Novack made that call,” Tanner said, “it would be very easy to use that phone to do so.”

Although he was suggesting that May Abad was behind everything, he acknowledged that he couldn’t be certain.
The reason, he explained, was that investigators had never bothered to search May’s hotel room, or properly question her about where she was when Ben Novack was killed.

“I don’t have to prove May Abad is guilty,” he told the jury.
“I don’t have to solve this crime.
They have to prove Narcy Novack is guilty.”

*   *   *

At 1:38
P.M
.
on Thursday, it was prosecutor Elliott Jacobson’s turn to have the final word, before the jury went out to deliberate.
Wearing his trademark red bow tie and an immaculately pressed checked suit, the wiry prosecutor told the jury that the only way the killers had had access to Ben Novack was through his wife.
He said no one else in the entire world would have known the exact time to send in the killers to carry out “these horrific and savage crimes.”

“If ever there was a plot hatched in hell, it was this one,” the prosecutor said.

He then compared Cristobal Veliz to a child telling fairy tales on the stand under oath.

“It was perjury so palpable,” he said, “that many of you were laughing.
You knew what he said up there doesn’t [comport] with reason and logic.
Why did he pitch that nonsense?
Because Cristobal Veliz has been buried under a mountain of investigative evidence, and will say just about anything not to go to jail for the rest of his life, for the brutal slaying of two human beings.”

At the end of his summation, Jacobson told the jury that Narcy Novack was ultimately responsible for these “brutal and particularly sadistic” murders.

“They didn’t just want to kill these people,” the prosecutor said.
“Somebody wanted to make them suffer.
Somebody was out for revenge.
Someone wanted to make sure that Bernice Novack would never speak again.
Someone wanted to make sure Ben Novack would never look at another woman again.
That someone was, and is, Narcy Novack.”