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Harmony Montgomery’s Stepmother Allegedly Told Police The Girl’s Father Killed The 5-Year-Old
Kayla Montgomery told investigators in June that Harmony Montgomery's father Adam, “encouraged her on multiple occasions to lie to police about Harmony’s whereabouts," according to new court documents.
The tragic fate of missing Harmony Montgomery was allegedly revealed by her stepmother during an interview with detectives earlier this year.
Prosecutors say that Kayla Montgomery told detectives during a June 3 interview that Harmony “had been murdered in December 2019” by the young girl’s father, Adam Montgomery, according to court records obtained by Oxygen.com.
Adam—who is already behind bars on other charges—was arrested for the murder of his daughter on Monday and is facing charges of second-degree murder, falsifying physical evidence, abuse of a corpse and tampering with witnesses in connection with her death, according to a statement from the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office.
Prosecutors allege that Adam killed the 5-year-old by “repeated striking” to her head with a closed fist on or around Dec. 7, 2019, “recklessly” causing her death.
Prosecutors described Adam as having an “extreme indifference to the value of human life,” when laying out the charges against him.
They believe he then concealed or destroyed her body and tried to intimidate his wife to not testify against him.
Kayla herself told detectives on June 3 that Adam had “encouraged her on multiple occasions to lie to police about Harmony’s whereabouts, basically giving Kayla a ‘cover story’ and telling her that as long as she stuck to the cover story everything would be OK,” the court documents allege.
Detectives had been interviewing Kayla at the time in connection with firearm charges against Adam. He’s been charged with possession as a felon, theft, and receiving stolen property in connection to allegations that he stole or possessed a rifle and shotgun in September or October of 2019.
“While interviewing Kayla on June 3, investigators attempted to keep separate the portion of the interview that focused on the defendant and firearms from the portion that focused on Harmony’s murder. However, despite investigators’ efforts, there was significant bleed-over between the topics,” prosecutors said.
His defense team had previously asked a judge not to allow his wife’s statements in the firearms case arguing that the state had failed to disclose Kayla’s statement within the required 45-day window, according to court documents obtained by Oxygen.com.
Harmony’s biological mother, Crystal Sorey, reported her missing in November after being unable to contact her for years.
Sorey lost custody of her daughter in 2018 due to substance abuse issues and told investigators that she last spoke with her daughter in a FaceTime call around Easter of 2019, according to an affidavit previously obtained by Oxygen.com.
She told police she tried to find her daughter in the months that followed but said Adam and Kayla “had blocked all communication” from her on social media and their cell phones.
The last known sighting of Harmony was in late 2019, authorities said.
After the young girl was reported missing, investigators launched a massive search effort to find her, but announced in August that they believed she was dead.
“All of these efforts have led us to conclude that Harmony Montgomery was murdered in Manchester in early December of 2019,” New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella said, according to Boston.com. “At this point, while Harmony’s remains have not yet been located, we do have multiple sources of investigative information — including just recently confirmed biological evidence — that have led us to this difficult and tragic conclusion.”
Adam, who has been in jail since January, is also facing child abuse charges in connection to allegations that he gave his daughter a black eye in 2019 months before she disappeared.
Kayla is also facing criminal charges in connection with the case. She was charged with theft by deception after police alleged that she fraudulently collected welfare benefits meant for Harmony, even though she knew the child was no longer living with them. She’s also facing charges in connection with allegations that she received stolen firearms from Adam, according to WFXT.
