>> it's a riveting mystery that started in a place of glamour. >> it became a destination for a rat packs, for frank sinatra -- >> and ended in a case of murder. the wealthy heir to this legendary hotel, dead. >> he was my father. he was the only father i ever knew. >> now, police said she was next. someone in the shadows gunning for her. >> my suspicions are growing and growing by the minute. >> so who is behind all this? plenty of suspects and plenty of motives. anger, jealousy, greed. someone had 10 million reasons to kill. >> if you look back and say, my god, i can't believe what i saw. >> you are not going to believe it either because in this case, there is a final terrifying twist. >> i see him arriving with the crowbar. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> hello and welcome to "dateline". ben novak junior was a successful entrepreneur and the wealthy son of a miami businessman. then, he was found bound and bludgeoned to death in a new york hotel room. who wanted ben novak dead? in this case, there was no shortage of suspects or, possible motives. but a mysterious letter will lead detectives in the direction no one expected. here is dennis murphy with family affair. >> if ever there was a little girl lost, it was may. >> from when i was little, i was always in the way. >> she survived a mother daughter relationship quite unlike any you've ever heard. >> my mother is like trying to hug a cactus. you will eventually get hurt. >> and at the intersection of blood and money, -- intrigues you, there's plenty of both just ahead. >> it's really an amazing, unusual, frightening story. >> what ended so badly in a darkened hotel room with the curtains drawn, has its beginnings really in the warm sands of south florida. not the south beach of today with its hot bodies and pulsating dance clubs. that's all marketing reinvention of a much older miami beach. we need to go back 50 years or more. when caddies with tail fins were pulling into the newest, glitziest hotel and the east coast, the fountain would. >> miami should be a great city. >> a hotel real or dealer called ben novak builds it. steven gaines wrote about the era in his book fools paradise. >> it became a destination for the rat pack, frank sinatra, a lot of major stars were appearing. lots of movies were shot there. >> novak was the king and he needed a queen to preside over his aqua colored palace. he found one in the former coca-cola model named bernie with her beauty and effortless charm, bernice turned out to be the perfect hostess to greet the celebrities, gangsters, and just plain guests, who made the fountain blue the scene of its day. king ben and queen bernice lived over the store in the penthouse suite, then came along the young prince, ben novak junior. >> he was a spoiled kid, he was a brat. >> ben junior, don't call him benji, would be trotted out to shake hands with the vip's. then it was back up the hotel elevator to home. birthday cakes came from room service. and the kids who came to the birthday party were complete strangers to him. just kids who are passing through the hotel. >> the friendless lonely boy disliked by his father's help lost himself in the fantasy world of batman. the superhero became an obsession, even as an adult, ben junior was still amassing a floor to ceiling collection of batman memorabilia. he even bought a bat mobile from the old tv show. but there was no holding off the real world and change. just as the rat pack faded away, so too did the fountain blue. by the late seventies, miami beach was regarded as a stale place for old people. ben novak senior lost the hotel to bankruptcy and died not long afterwards. the son, ben junior, all grown up now, stayed in the hospitality business and made his mark. he created a company run out of his home here that organized conventions at big hotels. like his father, he was a hard nosed businessman, and in time, he was grossing $50 million a year. and like his father, he needed someone like his mother to mix and mingle with the clients. he found that woman in a recent emigrate from ecuador, her name was --, and she had a little girl named may. >> why do you think they became a couple and not just passing through the night? >> my mother's a lot of fun. she definitely partied. >> when ben junior met her, she was partying for tips as a stripper in a sleazy miami club. supporting herself and her little girl. >> she did very well with it? >> she did very well. my mom is a survivor. she could do just about anything. >> she left behind her stripper pole to marry ben novak junior. but the little girl felt like so much excess baggage in her mother's new relationship. she was dispatched to boarding school at the age of eight. >> did you feel like you've been shipped off? >> kind of. >> you had a tough childhood? >> best thing is that it's over. >> ben junior and her mother lived in a 2 million dollar fort lauderdale state with a boat out back. his elderly mother, bernice, live not far away. but may, the step fought daughter, was never going to be a good richmond trust fund kid. she grew up tough and hard, estranged from her mother. paying her own way with bartending and waitressing jobs. she had two children young and sweated the bills. it was the grandchildren that ultimately thawed some of the ice between mother and daughter. >> she may have been a horrible mother but she was the best grandmother. she did everything with them. >> and ben junior warmed to may. the one-time lonely prince belatedly seemed to recognize a kindred spirit in lonely, neglected may. >> he saw me as his daughter and i did see him as my father. and he had no children of his own. >> ben, after his own stunted childhood, finally found in his grandchildren some kids who wanted to play with all his batman stuff. >> he did a lot of the grandfather things with them. a lot of, i, think why we saw so much of each other was because of those two boys. >> when she was in her late twenties, ben junior asked may to become part of his very successful convention organizing business. she would work alongside her mother and his mother, bernice it had taken 20 years, but they were finally becoming a family. >> i actually got older and got into the business, he was there guided me and showed me how to do things. >> and then sadness, in the spring of 2009, bernice, in her late eighties, had apparently slipped and took a nasty fall one coming out of her fall car. she struggled into the house and died. may thought the time had come. for years, ben had been asking her to consider becoming his legally adopted daughter. she thought it would be the perfect father's day gift for him. >> i started thinking we bernice had just passed and it would be something nice for him to be like, ok, you do have a daughter. because i do feel like i have him as a father, to this day. so it never got legally changed. the paperwork is still on his desk. >> it never got attended to because of the brutal event three months after bernice's passing. ben, narci, and may we're putting up another big convention in a hotel in new york suburban district county. just after 7:30 sunday morning, on july 12th 2009. the last day of the convention. hotel security got the urgent call. something very bad had happened in one of the sweets. a 58-year-old man had been found bound and bludgeoned to death in the bedroom. ben novak junior, the one-time prince of the fountain blue, had been murdered. >> coming up. the investigation begins. >> but comings and goings of every room, every guest -- >> 150 rooms. >> when dateline continues. sotyktu is the first-of-its-kind, once-daily pill for moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis... for the chance at clear or almost clear skin. it's like the feeling of finding that outfit psoriasis tried to hide from you. or finding your swimsuit is ready for primetime. dad! once-daily sotyktu is proven to get more people clearer skin than the leading pill. don't take if you're allergic to sotyktu; serious reactions can occur. sotyktu can lower your ability to fight infections including tb. serious infections, cancers including lymphoma, muscle problems, and changes in certain labs have occurred. tell your doctor if you have an infection, liver or kidney problems, high triglycerides, or had a vaccine or plan to. sotyktu is a tyk2 inhibitor. tyk2 is part of the jak family. it's not known if sotyktu has the same risks as jak inhibitors. find what plaque psoriasis has been hiding. ask your dermatologist about sotyktu for clearer skin. so clearly you. sotyktu. after advil. feeling better? 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on top of the worlddddd!!! before advil. advil targets pain at the source of inflammation. when pain comes for you, come back fast with advil liqui-gels. >> the sprawling hilton hotel, in new york was host to 2000 amway conventioneers, that summer in 2009. one of the suites had become a homicide site. sergeant terri wilson, from the local police, would lead the investigation. >> i couldn't believe what we saw, i went in the room, and there was the victim, hog-tied, on the floor. and it was a bloody mess. >> what does that tell you? this was a targeted individual. >> is it true his eyes were also gouged out? >> yes, yes. >> sergeant wilson learned that the victim was banned novak, junior. a name that meant nothing to him. the murdered man's wife and stepdaughter had been escorted to a nearby hotel room, so investigators could take their statements. the wife of 20 years, marsai, told sergeant wilson that her husband had been working on convention details all night, and, didn't go to bed, she thought until about 6:30. >> she then went downstairs to oversee getting breakfast organized for the convention attendees. >> did you verify that the wife was in attendance at the breakfast? >> we did, yes, we confirmed what she was saying. >> the stepdaughter, who manage the company money on these road trips, confirmed her mother story of coming down to pitch him with breakfast. >> i was thinking, yes, there are a lot of people, i wanted to take any help i could get. >> after the breakfast rush, narcy says she called her husband up in the room. no answer. >> and then she comes back at what 7:30 and find some? >> yes. >> she told detectives that she tripped over the body, then bolted over out of the room, to yell for help. >> our security guard was holding at the end of his feet, and -- was continuing to lunge toward the body, howling and screaming at the top of her lungs. >> when -- later told police about the timeline of the murder, the computerize key confirmed her recollection. >> her courage was trying to get in the room at 7:30. >> she had been there just after midnight. >> there had been no activity up until midnight? >> going up until the door, and then runaway, telling us that she ran away from the inside. >> if narcy had been downstairs helping with breakfast, and no key other than the wife's had opened the door since midnight, who then, had admitted the killer or killers? an early on mystery. >> this woman, meanwhile, had been summoned to her hotel suite by the manager. >> i asked what happened, and they said he's gone. what do you mean he's gone? try, go do something. the hotel guards wouldn't let her in the room. >> one officer said it was a bloodbath in there. >> a bloodbath that sent her mother into hysterics. >> she's emotional, she's whaling to you? >> she's throwing herself on the floor. she says, i think they are after all the convention money, it had to be a robbery, they know we have money, somebody must have been watching. >> unusually, the business ran on cash. the exhibitors would turn over their dollars to the stepdaughter may, and her assistance onsite. this weekend they had taken in over $100,000. that money was not being kept in the hotel safe behind the desk. rather, it was being stashed in closets, under the beds of the staff members. question. had an insider, who knew about their business, tortured ben to cough up the cash? >> they had about $100,000 in cash. >> so you are in motivation country, right now. >> we are trying to figure out what's going on. >> they didn't get anything from him, so a horse i'm scared, not just for myself but for the staff. >> if someone had been roaming the hotel hallways, with money and murder on their mind, there were 2000 potential suspects. a detectives nightmare. >> we decided we were going to download the locks of the entire hotel. >> the comings and goings of every room? >> 450 rooms. it took us that much. >> the hotel was bristling with security cameras. unfortunately for the investigators, none were in the hallway outside the murder room. one of the first things the cops did was round up all the cash. and get it stored in the hotel safe, until the banks opened in the morning. then sergeant wilson posted a guard at the hotel room, being shared by the mother and daughter. before that sunday night was over, the two women would have another round of questioning by the detectives. >> they totally grilled me, and you get mad. so first, i was fighting back. of course. >> they asked you the question, did you do it? >> correct. >> and one of the cop said, they have to ask these questions, and i said do, you have to get right here and ask the questions. >> this woman was a veteran westcott west chester county detective, she led some of the questioning. >> the daughter, what did you make of her? >> pretty much, i got a feeling she was being honest. but you never know, people are deceptive. >> the cops went through narcy and her story once again, hoping for some investigative nugget. >> and she was grieving, exactly, a widow, we need that information, the last person that saw her. >> narcy told attractive there was something of value miss missing, a gold bracelet spelling out bens name in diamonds. an expensive rolex watch was still on the bed lying in blood. as well as an unexplained broken stem from a cheap pair of sunglasses. and then there was the matter of her husband's huge batman collection, a rare collection valued at $43,000 he was planning on selling. >> that might have been a motivation for murder? his passion in life. he had a valuable comic, someone else wanted it? >> correct. >> sunday was over. on monday, the cops would hear about the novak's type of sex games, on monday, when mother and daughter started to go for one another's throats. coming up -- >> the suspicions were growing and growing by the minute. when "dateline" continues. the power goes out and we still have wifi to do our homework. and that's a good thing? great in my book! who are you? no power? no problem. introducing storm-ready wifi. now you can stay reliably connected through power outages with unlimited cellular data and up to 4 hours of battery back-up to keep you online. only from xfinity. home of the xfinity 10g network. hello. it is so fantastamazing to see other trolls. is this how people feel when they meet me? yes. poppy, i'm your sister. my what? whoo. did you just braid my hair? >> who had bound, gagged, and dennis murphy (voiceover): who had bound, gagged, and bludgeoned to death ben novack jr.? bludgeoned to death ben novack jr.? >> the scene was overwhelming. just thinking, oh my god. >> in this case, the detectives -- victim-ology would play a big role. finding out who the murdered person was, as well as the people in a circle of friends, his enemies. >> this is the address here? >> detective allison carpentier along with detective nelson would piece together an unflattering family portrait. >> in the beginning we didn't know if this is an affair, domestic, and random act? >> they cavill together the story of ben jr.. the while the son of a famous miami beach man with his eccentric batman collection. the wife from modest beginnings, the stepdaughter welcomed late to the family circle. >> we're still learning the dynamics of the family, how may was a stepchild. it took some time to learn about the family. >> the novak's came like the cast from a bad reality show. but good old fashion robbers were number one in the homicide. >> a lot of guys don't like his style. >> that's correct. >> he could've cultivated enemies along the line. >> they're a lot of people who didn't like him. >> on the monday following the sunday morning murder, narcy took her daughter to the more to identify ben's body -- >> i'm throwing up in the garbage can, detectives are right there and everything else, and we'll turn around and she is just staring at him. there was no emotion at all. from her. >> that monday, late into the night, narcy and her daughter were interrogated by the detectives. >> i should've been there and i wish i got killed with him. >> detective carpentier broached the sensitive subject of the couple sex life. >> i know this is hard -- >> do you want it to leave? >> yes. >> with the male detective out of the room, detective carpentier managed to win narcy 's trust. she found out that ben's into bondage. >> did you like it -- >> now here he'd been tied up. >> right. >> in the homicide. did you think that this is a sex game gone wrong? >> we brought it up to her and i confronted her out on that in the interview. >> ben is found in a way that he enjoys sexually. >> no, no. >> i just found it odd that the way he finds pleasurable, he's killed in the same way. >> because she was the spouse, the questions for narcy got sharper as the night were on. was she in on the murder? >> if i'm being asked if i let the men. no i did not let the men in. >> all the while, may have been outside eavesdropping in on her mother's interrogation. getting chills. >> may said that to me somebody told her it was a bloodbath. i don't remember anything blood. blood is red. >> just listening to her talk to detectives, nothing was making sense. >> when she heard her mother describe tripping over the body and reaching down to touch ben, alarms went off. she'd seen her mother shortly after that. >> i'm looking at her and there is no blood on her. >> in a scene that was described to you as a bloodbath? >> as a bloodbath, correct. and i'm looking at her from head toe -- >> and you don't see any evidence. >> i don't see any evidence on her. >> what's going on in your head? >> suspicions are growing, and growing by the minute. and i'm thinking that i'm a horrible human being for thinking my mom could do something like this. >> for 14 relentless hours, homicide actives trie