NARRATOR: When devout Catholic Tracey Wygant
marries local boy Chris Chanowitz,
she thinks it will be forever.
TRACEY: I don't believe in divorce.
I believe in marriage.
She married for better, for worse, no matter what.
NARRATOR: But the worst comes quickly.
TRACEY: He told me he was in love with another woman.
KELLY: Tracey fell to her knees
and told him not to leave her.
NARRATOR: Tracey's hopes and prayers fall on deaf ears.
KELLY: We don't trust him, and he's a liar.
TRACEY: Taylor told me that her father and her
went with this other woman.
NARRATOR: Until death do us part becomes the only way out.
KELLY: He premeditated this.
He planned it.
TRACEY: He put a blindfold around my eyes.
I thought it was going to be something romantic.
I couldn't wait for my surprise.
ADRIENNE: It was cheaper to pay for a funeral
than a divorce lawyer.
[theme music playing]
TRACEY: I love my family.
Family has always been important to me.
Stay home mom, a dad that worked very hard,
2 to 3 jobs a week.
He was a worker -- if your hands weren't dirty,
he said you didn't work today.
I'm the oldest.
I have a sister, Kelly, and a brother, Ray.
It was a really good childhood.
NARRATOR: Tracey Wygant comes from a devout Catholic family
in upstate New York -- in the 1960s,
she is a child growing up in an idyllic suburban life.
TRACEY: Lot of neighborhood kids hung out all day on their bikes.
My parents had an above the ground pool.
My mom would make everybody lemonade
and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
Everybody came to our house to swim,
and people wanted to be in our house.
NARRATOR: Including the nuns of St. Mary's from the local
convent, who adopt the Wygant family as their own.
They came to our house for picnics.
The neighbors would see a carload of nuns getting
out and sitting in the back with us and barbecuing.
TRACEY: My dad worked at Mount St. Mary's Convent.
He was their plumber, and then he ended up doing everything.
We would go for mass on Christmas Eve down at
their church.
Being with the sisters, the Catholic religion,
it was constantly there.
It's just really special to have them in our lives.
NARRATOR: Tracey is so sheltered by her family life,
she is tormented when one day, she finds
herself the target of a bully at school.
KELLY: There was one instance where we were on the bus,
and he made fun of her, and she started crying.
I had a pickle in a jar from a science
class experiment that I forgot was in my duffel bag.
When he was walking off the bus,
I swung my duffel bag -[boy grunts]
and hit him across the back of the head.
I'm sure it hurt.
And I told him to leave my sister alone.
The problem with me --
I was very shy and very timid.
KELLY: My sister, Tracey, is the older sister.
She's three years older than I am.
But I really do believe that that is the day
where I took on that role of trying to protect her.
TRACEY: When I turned 18,
I went to Mount St. Mary's College in Newburgh in 1978.
And then I just went into teaching.
NARRATOR: Between studying and a part-time job,
Tracey doesn't go out much.
When I was in college, I didn't dorm in the school.
I wanted to be home.
NARRATOR: But one day, when a friend
asks her out on a double date,
she accepts, and it's a date with destiny.
We decided to go out for dinner.
And she comes with a man.
He's a very nice-looking man,
brown hair, mustache,
because they were big back in those days.
And we seemed to talk a lot.
NARRATOR: Tracey finds herself ignoring her date
and is attracted to her friend's date,
whose name is Chris Chanowitz.
He's a local guy who works at a commercial offset printers.
He comes from a family of five kids.
He grew up Catholic in the town of Newburgh,
about 10 minutes from where I lived.
I did think he was cute.
NARRATOR: Tracey doesn't see Chris again until a few months
later when she spots him outside a mall in Newburgh.
TRACEY: Kelly and I were going out for dinner,
and I pointed Chris out
to my sister, and she said,
"Go give him your phone number."
I remember being very nervous, and I went up to him,
and I said, "Call me sometime,"
and he called me the next day.
NARRATOR: On their first date,
Chris and Tracey go out for pizza and hit it off.
Tracey has never had a serious boyfriend,
and soon, she is falling in love.
I had butterflies in my stomach, and I couldn't eat.
I felt that feeling like lovesick or something.
And then when I would come out of college,
he would leave notes for me on my car.
And every week, he gave me a rose.
I couldn't wait to go to my car and see the note, like,
you know, that was fun.
That was, like, happiness.
KELLY: Chris liked her because she has a good heart.
She's sensitive.
She's sweet. She was about to have a career.
She treated him really, really well.
She made him a priority in her life.
He seemed absolutely perfect for her.
NARRATOR: On Halloween night, just eight months
after they meet, Chris plans a special surprise.
We were going out to the movies,
and he was really late,
and I was mad that he was late,
and he gave me a plastic pumpkin,
and inside was all this candy,
and I looked, and there was a box.
It was a diamond engagement ring.
He never really came out and said,
"Would you marry me" or anything like that.
It's like typical me -- took it, put it on.
We're getting married.
None of the words were said.
We felt happy for Tracey when she got engaged.
We did like Chris, and we were happy that
he was gonna be a part of our family.
It felt good. It felt romantic.
[distant church bells ringing]
We got married in the convent.
KELLY: I was the maid of honor at Tracey's wedding.
Tracey got married at
the Dominican Sister Motherhouse Chapel.
We always described it as like being in The Sound of Music .
Right in front of you was the Hudson River.
It was a dream of my parents
for us to get married there.
It's all marble, all white, and all the nuns were there.
My limo broke down -- we got to the church late,
and one of Chris's friends told me that he was upset.
He was worried, because I was late,
and that always made me feel happy,
that he cared for me, that he loved me.
That made me happy.
NARRATOR: Soon, the newlyweds move into
an apartment and settle into a routine.
He left the commercial offset printers,
and he worked for Texaco Company.
And then he got a job in IBM.
I was teaching in Newburgh.
I got hired in August of that summer, '84.
NARRATOR: Chris works the night shift on an assembly line.
And so I was home every night by myself, and I hated that.
My sister, Kelly, and my mom would --
we would go out shopping on Saturdays.
So Friday nights, a lot of times I went,
I slept at my parents' house.
NARRATOR: Tracey finds her first year especially challenging.
[school bell ringing]
The discipline was so tough on me.
I remember cans of crayons being thrown over my head,
and it was very, very difficult on me.
He went to work with me crying in the bathroom in the corner,
hysterical, like having a nervous breakdown,
because the behavior was so bad,
and I couldn't get a handle on it.
I didn't know what to do.
If he gave me some love,
some hugs, tell me it's gonna be okay,
I probably would have been great,
because that's all I needed, but he didn't.
[distant sobbing]
NARRATOR: Tracey has her heart set on buying land
and building her dream home,
but it is difficult to save money.
Chris gets a second job at a local business as a salesman.
TRACEY: He got a job at a woman's store
with all women.
And then women would leave notes on his car.
It didn't matter if they were pretty, ugly.
It didn't matter what they looked like.
He still flirted with them.
Women shouldn't be leaving notes on his car.
He's a married man.
NARRATOR: Tracey complains to Chris about
his flirting, but he doesn't stop.
He never hesitated telling Tracey that
other women were looking at him.
He did like to make her insecure, because then she clung
on to him a little bit more, and he liked that attention.
NARRATOR: After four years, they're no closer
to buying a home.
So Tracey and Chris come up with a new plan to save money.
TRACEY: We gave up the apartment,
and I went to my parents' house,
and he went to his parents' house.
We lived off my paycheck and put his into savings.
I just never knew what he made.
He never brought a paycheck home and showed me.
Tracey asked him if she could go
stay at his parents', as well.
And he said there was no need for that,
that she was better off in her house, in her own bedroom.
We just thought it was all so weird.
It was hard on the marriage, and Tracey cried a lot.
She wanted to be with him, and he just kept saying to her,
"You want a house, don't you?
This is what we have to do to get the house."
[distant cheering and church bells]
NARRATOR: For two years,
Tracey and Chris continue their unusual arrangement,
seeing each other as much as their busy schedules allow.
Finally, their sacrifice pays off.
They save enough to buy their own home,
or at least Tracey does.
She has to pay for it all.
We don't know where he would have
the money saved for any of this.
We decided we were going to get a piece
of land and put a modular home on there.
We put a down payment on a home.
NARRATOR: But before they break ground,
in front of friends and family,
Chris drops a bombshell that will ruin everything.
He told me he was in love with another woman,
[distant scream]
and her name was Shannon.
AS CHRIS: I met a woman. Her name's Shannon.
TRACEY: He said that he was backing out of building a house.
AS CHRIS: ...Not gonna build the house anymore.
It was awful.
So Shannon was
a woman who worked at the mall who Tracey would see him
talking to all the time and never thought he would
ever be with her.
But what was even more shocking was
Tracey's reaction to it.
Tracey fell to her knees,
held on to his leg,
cried, and told him not to leave her.
TRACEY: Being a nice Catholic girl,
you don't get divorced.
I didn't know what to do.
NARRATOR: Tracey Wygant's husband,
Chris, has just told her
he is having an affair with another woman.
Basically, what I did is put my head in the ground.
It was sad.
I didn't know where to turn, what to do.
I didn't tell my friends.
KELLY: He was done,
but he wasn't done... for her.
This was all I got.
How am I gonna get anything in
the future if I don't fight for him?
[distant sobbing]
NARRATOR: Six months go by.
Tracey continues to live at home,
hoping Chris will eventually reconcile.
I had to go and get the money back for the down payment.
There was no talk of divorce, and I would
go to the church where we got married,
and I would go in there by myself and just pray
for everything to get better.
And I would do that a lot.
NARRATOR: And then one day,
he shows up at her work unexpectedly.
TRACEY: And he had with him pamphlets for condos.
So we started looking at condos.
I was hopeful, because why would he do that?
NARRATOR: Chris tells her he is no longer
seeing the other woman.
I'm thinking everything's back, everything's fine.
She doesn't exist anymore. It's done.
[light laughter]
NARRATOR: Tracey and Chris start afresh,
and instead of buying a condo,
they find another piece of land.
TRACEY: It's in the Wallkill area,
out by the Shawangunk Mountains,
and we picked out a house from a magazine.
It wasn't like he was like, you know, being all sweet
and nice -- I just settled and just -- just kept going.
NARRATOR: Within a few months,
Tracey finds out she's pregnant.
When you have a body growing inside of you,
it's wonderful and weird at the same time.
It was also a very difficult time.
We were building a house, and I'm pregnant.
KELLY: Chris, he's gonna be the best.
He's going to build a house.
He's going to make it bigger and better than
everybody else's.
Did they have the money for it?
No, he hired people he knew, then didn't pay them.
They were in debt.
NARRATOR: Just as they finish building their new house,
their daughter, Taylor, is born in February 1991.
TRACEY: Come see baby Taylor!
This is baby Taylor's first Easter.
She was just absolutely beautiful.
CHRIS: Taylor!
TRACEY: Long, Goldilock hair. Gorgeous.
Mmm! Oatmeal and bananas.
CHRIS: Mm. Yum yum yum yum.
NARRATOR: Tracey goes back to work after three months of
maternity leave.
Chris is on night shift, so he takes care of Taylor
during the day.
Chris took Taylor to the zoo, the park.
He would meet other people,
women with children, and I'm sure that he was flirting
with other women.
He would fulfill that role of
the mother and the father with Taylor,
because Tracey was working.
TRACEY: If we were at my sister's for a picnic,
he would be with all the kids,
and he would knock the parents down and say, oh,
I'm down here with their kids, like he was the greatest.
CHRIS: Ho ho ho ho. Santa Claus was here.
Look... at all... your presents.
Daddy, can you open them?
CHRIS: Can you open 'em? Sure can.
TRACEY: Yay!
CHRIS: Merry Christmas. Where's my Merry Christmas kiss?
NARRATOR: Years go by, and Taylor grows closer to her dad,
who seems to do all the fun things.
CHRIS: Hey, you!
I think most of my field trips,
my dad came on as the parent.
Hi, I'm Taylor, and I'm at Macy's parade.
This is the fireman!
During parties,
you would find him in the pool with us, having fun.
My dad was always involved, always playing with the kids.
CHRIS: Yeah! Good girl!
NARRATOR: But Chris has little time for Tracey,
and their marriage suffers.
He said I have a stomach, so no sex.
[actor as Chris groans]
That was awful.
We did Nutrisystem, and I got really skinny,
and he still said I had a belly.
We felt that he was having an affair,
because there was just really no desire,
no connection.
And it was frustrating for me, because I knew
my sister was believing his lies.
TRACEY: Inside, I'm dying -- no intimacy.
I would cry, and I would beg him,
and he would go like this at me, [mockingly] "Aw, really?"
[snoring lightly]
NARRATOR: When her sister Kelly's family
visits Disney World,
Tracey suggests they join them, hopeful that a vacation might
rekindle their intimacy.
KELLY: Tracey really looked forward to that,
the whole family walking around Disney World.
We took out a loan to take Taylor.
We were together,
and one night, I woke up in
the middle of the night, and he was gone.
I don't know where he was.
She said that Chris kept disappearing.
We'd be waiting for the parade, and he'd say, oh,
he's gonna go buy Taylor something,
and he'd be gone for hours.
She goes, "I just have a feeling that he wasn't alone."
TRACEY: I was hoping for a change.
I just kept waiting for that miracle to happen.
[phone ringing]
NARRATOR: After they return,
and just when Tracey is at her emotional bottom,
her sister calls with more devastating news.
TRACEY: She told me that our mom died.
My mom's death was awful for us.
TRACEY: Chris, he had no choice.
He had to be with me during that time.
And then I had him go up to this casket and tell
my mom not to worry, that he always would be there for me.
I had him tell her that.
And then it was Thanksgiving weekend.
My family has a cabin in the Catskills with a gun club.
So Chris says he's going up to the cabin and go hunting,
and my sister could not believe that
he was leaving me after my mom just died.
He would tell my father that real men
don't stay in the cabin.
They go off, and they get a tent,
and they sleep in the woods.
NARRATOR: Chris and Tracey's dad go to the cabin,
but Chris disappears.
Now, Chris had a hunting gun, but he didn't hunt.
TRACEY: And my father, he searched
to see if he could find him,
and he followed his tracks,
and then they just stopped.
There was no tent. He disappeared.
[distant horn honking]
NARRATOR: Chris has been picked up
on the road outside the cabin...
by another woman,
someone who Taylor has already met.
TAYLOR: My first memory of meeting another woman
was going to the Ulster County pool.
My dad told me he was going to meet a friend of
his from work, and she had a little girl with her, too.
I remember playing with all of them in the pool.
She was a few years younger than me.
NARRATOR: Taylor plays with the little girl named Megan
on more than one occasion.
We went hiking together one time up in Minnewaska.
There was definitely a few times he had me go meet her.
He was treating both of us kind of the same.
It was bothering me,
and she kept calling him dad.
NARRATOR: Tracey's daughter, Taylor, meets another girl
who is calling her father, dad.
He said that she didn't have a father of her own,
so he was trying to step into that role for her.
And then he would make me pinky swear not
to tell my mom anything about what we did.
Taylor told me that her father and her went with
this other woman to some falls up
by Kingston, New York,
and he has her pinky swear not to tell me.
And then when I questioned him about it,
he just said it was a friend he ran into.
KELLY: Tracey's a smart person,
and I think that somewhere inside, she definitely didn't
believe him,
but she was so afraid of bringing it to the surface,
because she didn't want
the consequences of what would happen to their marriage.
I was waiting for things to get better.
It will get better, it'll get better.
Hang in there.
[overlapping conversations]
NARRATOR: In February of 1998,
Taylor celebrates her seventh birthday -- by this time,
everyone but Tracey seems to be on to Chris.
I think that's the last birthday
I remember with my father being there.
KELLY: We believe that he's living a double life.
He is off buying things
and telling my husband
that he has charge cards that Tracey doesn't know about.
And I think he's doing it just to add fuel to all of our fire.
NARRATOR: By the time summer arrives,
Tracey and Chris have not been intimate for over four years.
TRACEY: I thought he was gay for a while.
There was a manager at IBM that he kept talking about
that was gay that he hung out with,
and also the lack of sex for years.
So it was making me think,
"Well, jeez, maybe he is gay."
I did ask questions, but there were always lies.
I was gagging and throwing up.
That's how bad I was -- crying,
felt like I didn't have anybody in the world.
[distant sobbing]
NARRATOR: In September,
at the start of the school year,
Chris starts spending time alone in the garage.
He tells Tracey that he is working on something special
for her.
TRACEY: He said to me, "I have a surprise for you.
Don't tell your sister about it,"
and I told her, 'cause I thought
it was gonna be something romantic.
KELLY: She just was really excited about it, and I think
she felt that it was going to make their marriage better.
TRACEY: I was excited.
I couldn't wait for my surprise.
NARRATOR: Chris even puts up garbage bags to black out
the windows in the garage so that Tracey can't peek.
TRACEY: I heard noises.
I don't know exactly what he was doing.
We also bought unfinished furniture that he would paint
and stain over the years,
so it could be something like that.
To me, he was working on my surprise.
So I didn't want to open the door and ruin it and peek.
AS CHRIS: Hey, honey.
NARRATOR: As the weekend approaches,
Chris seems to be more flirtatious.
TRACEY: He picked me up,
and I got embarrassed, and I got shy,
and I asked him to put me down.
He never picked me up before, never.
And I was uncomfortable with that, because I'm heavy.
Within a few hours later, he had me move a ladder,
and I thought it was strange that he didn't do it.
He had me do it.
AS CHRIS: Right there, that's great -- great!
NARRATOR: On the evening of September 12th, 1998,
Chris, Tracey, and Taylor arrive home early
from a dinner with friends.
TRACEY: He told me about the surprise.
He was getting the surprise ready, and I went to
the living room while he was out in the garage.
NARRATOR: While Taylor sleeps upstairs,
Tracey waits in anticipation.
He comes in and gets me and tells me the surprise is ready.
He put a blindfold around my eyes, tightened it up.
NARRATOR: Chris places an envelope in Tracey's hand.
He told me it was part of his surprise.
She thought maybe it was airline tickets,
and she was hoping it was a trip.
TRACEY: And he had to help me out to the garage.
I was okay with it, because when somebody's
gonna surprise you,
sometimes they do that, they put a blindfold on you.
He opens the door and then puts me at the first step.
So I'm out on the first step.
He's behind me.
He tells me the surprise is not ready.
NARRATOR: Chris leads Tracey back to the couch,
removes the blindfold, and she waits again.
He comes back out to the living room
and tells me the surprise is ready now.
He had to do a couple of things.
So we go through the same routine.
Opens the door, helps me down to the first step.
AS CHRIS: Come on this way.
It wasn't ready. Again.
-AS CHRIS: No, it's not ready. -TRACEY: We go back in.
I go right back to the couch.
NARRATOR: Finally, the surprise is ready.
Chris re-blindfolds Tracey and again
places the envelope in her hand.
Now it's just quiet,
and I can hear him breathing behind me.
Now I'm starting to get suspicious.
Now I'm starting to get a little nervous.
NARRATOR: He leads her into the garage,
and Tracey waits again for what seems like eternity.
My heart was pounding out of my chest.
I felt something come down my neck.
[man grunts]
NARRATOR: Tracey Wygant's husband, Chris, has just
slipped a noose over her head.
And my reaction was to hit it off.
[grunts]
And I quickly hit the blindfold up off me
and looked up, and he was above me,
and he had big gloves on,
and I saw him holding the rope
with a noose.
[distantly] AS TRACEY: My God! What are you doing?!
I went into an out of my body experience,
like numb, is this really happening?
AS TRACEY: What are you doing?
It could have been a diamond.
It could have been pearls, but it wasn't, it was a noose.
She was seconds away from death, seconds.
He was going to pull Tracey up by the noose.
He was gonna hold onto it until she was dead.
TRACEY: I looked up,
and I said to him, "What's going on?"
And he let the noose go, and he went
to the corner of the garage, and he was crying.
He said that he was in love
with another woman, and we have a child.
NARRATOR: Tracey doesn't consider that she might still be in danger.
I thought about it more afterwards.
Like, how stupid was I thinking that maybe
he wouldn't take a gun and shoot me.
He could have easily done that.
I was shaking at this time, and I said,
"I'm going to call my sister."
[phone ringing]
We were sound asleep, and it was Tracey.
She was crying hysterically and wanted me to come up there.
[distant, indistinct talking]
Like now.
I called my father and asked him to come up to Tracey's,
and I said, "It's bad news.
I bet it's an affair again."
[doorbell rings]
I went to the front door, and Chris opened the door.
He looked disheveled, tired.
He looked like a -- like a monster.
I turned and saw Tracey sitting on the couch,
and she was rocking,
and she was crying.
So I knelt down next to her,
and I said, "Tracey, what's going on?
Tell me what's happening."
And she said, "He has another woman and a child.
Her name is Megan," and I could tell
she was trying to process it.
And I turned to look at him, and I said to him,
"That was your surprise? This is your surprise?"
NARRATOR: Chris sees Tracey's father coming
and leaves to go meet him outside.
KELLY: That gave me the opportunity to say to Tracey,
"That was your surprise?"
And she said, "No, he tried to hang me in the garage."
At that point, I went into the garage area.
The windows were all blackened out with black plastic bags.
The ladder was standing there,
and there was the noose.
And she said, "Tracey, I have to call the police,"
and I'm begging her not to call the police.
NARRATOR: Kelly calls 911.
Everything was definitely surreal that night.
Everything seemed to go in slow motion.
NARRATOR: Tracey tells Kelly that she asked
Chris why he wanted to kill her.
And he said, "You made me do this to you."
And she said, "Why? What did I do?
What did I do wrong?"
And he said, "You made me do this.
You would never let me go."
[distant sobbing]
This is bad. This is really bad.
I'm very concerned about my sister,
because I think she's going to have
a severe mental breakdown.
[sobbing]
NARRATOR: Tracey's dad is startled when police arrive
on the scene.
KELLY: And he said, "Why would you call the police?
This is just an affair."
And I looked at my father, and I said, "No, it's not dad.
He tried to hang her in the garage."
At that point,
my father just leapt through the air...
AS TRACEY'S FATHER: You son of a bitch!
...and jumped on Chris.
And that's when the police quickly grabbed my father
and Chris. -Son of a bitch! Oh!
NARRATOR: The officers escort Chris into another room.
ADRIENNE: He was pacing, wringing his hands.
He kept apologizing.
He says, "I wanted to do a double suicide.
I wanted to kill my wife and then kill myself."
I'm like, "Now, you know, that's not a double suicide.
We call it murder-suicide."
I said, "Well, how were you gonna kill yourself?"
He says, "Well, I got a gun."
He showed me the gun. It was in a closet...
all the way back in the closet.
I found the .308 that was in there.
I'm like, "Okay, where's the ammo?"
"I don't know."
Okay, and how were you going to off yourself with a gun
if there's no ammo available?
Something's not right.
NARRATOR: Chris is arrested,
but only for menacing and endangerment.
TRACEY: He had me move the ladder
to get my prints on the ladder.
Him having me hold the note was gonna be a suicide letter,
and he picked me up because he wanted to see
how he could pull me to hang me.
The police say when the surprise wasn't ready
that he was trying to get his nerve up.
If he did what he was gonna do the first time,
maybe even the second, he would have succeeded.
Tracey ended up in a psychiatric hospital.
EMMANUEL: It's like being hit with a double blow.
The love of your life has just tried to kill you.
You get out of it, and then he hits
you with the other blow that kills your heart.
It kills your soul.
NARRATOR: The next morning,
Kelly races to gain emergency custody
of Taylor before Chris makes bail.
NARRATOR: Tracey Wygant spends a week in a psychiatric hospital
trying to understand why her husband tried to kill her.
He wanted it to look like I committed suicide.
He wanted to look like the victim.
Everybody would have been crying for him and feeling
bad for him, and he would have came out victorious.
NARRATOR: If Chris had succeeded, he would
have avoided a custody battle for Taylor.
He would have got the house.
He would got money from the New York State
Teachers Union.
They would have been set, and they would live
happily ever after, the four of them in the house.
That was his goal.
It was cheaper to pay for a funeral than a divorce lawyer.
I believe she saved her own life.
Tracey would never have divorced him.
Even after that night,
I don't think she wanted to divorce him.
NARRATOR: After Tracey returns home from the hospital,
she gets full custody of Taylor and then searches
the house for evidence of Chris's double life.
I found special holiday cards, letters,
fake divorce papers, mail-in divorces.
KELLY: I'm sure he was showing his girlfriend
that he was going through a divorce.
NARRATOR: Proof positive that Chris was
seeing other women throughout their marriage.
TRACEY: One card I opened up, and it was
a Valentine's card, and it had a voice.
"Happy, happy heart day.
We love you very much -- love, Cathy and Taylor."
So it was, uh... not good for me.
So my family almost had to bring me back to the hospital.
That was hard.
There was a photo of Shannon in Disney World,
the same time that Tracey,
Chris, and Taylor took their Disney World trip.
So when he was disappearing, he was meeting Shannon.
[distant sobbing]
February 5th, 1999,
5 months after the attack,
a grand jury in Ulster County,
New York, upgrades Chris's menacing charge
to attempted murder in the second degree.
[gavel pounds]
EMMANUEL: Usually, the one who is unhappy should
be the one that takes a drastic measure.
But he wanted to maximize his happiness.
He wanted to have everything that
they had built together to himself.
So she was expendable to him.
NARRATOR: Just over a year later, in 2000,
they go to trial.
He sat there acting like he did nothing wrong.
He was the perfect husband who wanted a divorce.
That's it.
TRACEY: He told the jury that he was
trying to tell me it was over.
His defense was he was just trying to scare her
into a divorce, because she never would have left him.
The last time I saw my dad was when we went to court,
and it was just for a split second.
I was set to testify, give my own statements, and I was
halfway through the door, and the judge decided he didn't
need my testimony.
So I was immediately scooched back and out of the room.
NARRATOR: Tracey and Kelly take the stand,
but the evidence is airtight.
TRACEY: I was in a little bit of a fighting spirit
at that time but still very timid, still beaten up.
It was tough with his lawyer,
but I held my own.
What I think went wrong with Chris's plan
was that he lost his nerve.
But I also think that he could have done it.
NARRATOR: By unanimous vote,
a jury finds Chris Chanowitz guilty of attempted murder,
and he is sentenced to 15 years in prison.
TRACEY: I was looking at him when I read my victim response
for the sentencing.
He wouldn't let me look at him, because it was very heartfelt.
I cried.
Yeah, I was so upset.
I cried.
I did that for a couple of weeks.
[distant cheering and church bells]
NARRATOR: Tracey and Taylor sell the house
and start rebuilding their lives in a new home.
KELLY: I am proud of how Tracey came out of this.
For the last 25 years,
she has built a little life for her and Taylor in
this house.
She has made it a showstopper -- people stop and take pictures.
She does gardening outside,
and that has been her sanctuary.
NARRATOR: After serving 13 years,
Chris gets out of jail in 2013 and moves back to Wallkill.
TRACEY: I walk up in my front yard to go do something,
and there he drives by -- we make eye contact sometimes.
I was in Home Depot.
I just happened to go around the corner, and there he was,
and I started yelling for security.
I said there was an attempted murderer
in the store, and security was running.
I told him, "You better leave.
You almost killed my sister."
I was screaming at him at the top of my lungs, and he left.
NARRATOR: Taylor rejects her father
for what he did to her mother,
and now Tracey is retired from teaching
and has found new love.
Steve worked for the town of Newburgh.
He was a fireman for over 50 years.
He just loves me so much, and I love him.
Matter of fact, I'm missing him right now.
He's done so much for me.
I hit the jackpot.
She finally has found the perfect man for her,
who wants to take care of her and who truly,
truly loves her.
I feel like I have my older sister back.
TAYLOR: My mom's very funny.
She enjoys goofing off.
Never really acts her age,
always singing and dancing around the house,
even if it can drive me crazy sometimes.
TRACEY: I'm able to do it because Steve's in my life,
and that's giving me the strength.
And I think God knows now that I have the strength to do this.