familiar face and realized this had nothing to do with a car accident. this investigator kelly with from new york. i m like, ok. so, he sits down, grabs a tear, he s a fall away for me. and then i remember him, he s the guy that grilled me. the one that got my face. how are you feeling? oh my gosh, these people are back in my life four years later? at that point, i still didn t know what they wanted from me. i knew this guy was yelling at me. and then i just looked at him and said, i would like to speak to a lawyer. paul had already been interviewed by police several times. he thought this was all behind him. you knew it had to be about catherine? well, yeah, obviously it had something to do with that. later that day, the police went back to paul s house. and i went outside in the driveway with them and they said, we re sorry to have to bring this to you but paul novak is under arrest . i said, for what? they said, this is for his involvement in his wife s murder f
could never raise a child in this area. so, in 2002, paul and his wife catherine went house hunting in narrowsburg, new york. a small hamlet tucked between the catskill and poconos mountains. they didn t need to look for long. it was the big red house, as she called it. and she would talk about the big red house all the time. catherine s brother michael and sister-in-law joanne says she worked hard to make the big red house a home. growing up, we lived in apartments. you know, this was a space of her own. yeah, she was thrilled to have five acres, or ten acres of property. and she loved it there. the perfect place for the perfectly matched couple. they seemed meant for each other right from the start. i liked her from this first moment i met her. she was very effervescent. very funny and very opinionated. i really liked that in her. so, you really saw into the future the first time you saw her? yes. we ended up getting married, i think seven months later. two years
she was sobbing so hard. but catherine s family, who considered her the eternal optimist, watched her move on with her life. pouring all of her love and attention into her children. she was very focused on them. very engaged in their lives. did everything with them. sounds like that s what was important in her life anyway? absolutely. she was working at her children s school and had even been on a few dates. catherine was creating a life without paul. then, in december 2008, some time in the early morning hours, somewhere in her house, a fire started. a house is totally on fire. it s on fire. when firefighters arrived, the big, red house was a wall of flames. they had no idea if anyone was still inside. does anyone live there? yes, yes, the kids! are they out of the house? i don t know. neighbors knew paul wasn t there. he wasn t living in an apartment three hours away with his new girlfriend. that morning he got a call from catherine s pastor.
still, there was an age old motive, money to explain away. and in our interview, paul himself had a answer to that. are you having any financial issues at this point? at that point, i was in a better financial situation at that point suit previously. because i ended up getting a second job at a hospital in queens, for which i was high-paid. then he had his most crucial witness, paul s landlord. the defense wanted to use him to undermine a key point in the prosecution s case. scott and paul drove home to paul s house. you went straight to paul s house when you came back? yes. but on the stand, paul s landlord disputed that, he said he was setting photo shoot did not lay eyes on any of them. how could the man be out there and never sees scott sherwood or paul.
call was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, but michel, who knew about the murder plan from the beginning, walked away a free woman. a lot of people will be angry and think, this woman knew about a murder that was going to happen and didn t do anything. is it a perfect world, no. will she get hers? yes. when she dies. as for cat, she will continue to stand by paul. the couple married in 2018. the future for the children will be decided by the people who love them most, paul and catherine s families. we will work to get for those kids what catherine wanted for them. up in narrowsburg where catherine s beloved red house once stood, the trees glow