Harmony Montgomery trial: Father blames estranged wife for missing daughter’s death, admits cover-up
Warning: This article contains a recollection of crime and can be triggering to some, readers’ discretion advised.
MANCHESTER, NEW HAMPSHIRE: In a late-morning courtroom on Thursday, February 8, the defense team for Adam Montgomery, 33, the father who is accused of killing his long-missing daughter, argued that while he did not kill Harmony Montgomery, 5, he did assist in the cover-up and disposal of her corpse.
The accused man's lawyer made a strong opening statement, blaming his client's 33-year-old estranged wife Kayla Montgomery for the child's death. Kayla is scheduled to testify against her husband.
Adam's defense lawyer tries to pin blame on estranged wife
As per Law&Crime, in the Hillsborough County Court, defense lawyer Jamie Brooks summed up Kayla's involvement in the cover-up saying, "Kayla was an equal participant in the cover-up. She alone knows how Harmony died. And she won’t tell.”
Adam is charged with second-degree murder because it is purported that he killed Harmony by "repeatedly striking" her "in the head with a closed fist".
In addition, he was accused of abusing a corpse, tampering with witnesses, second-degree assault, and fabricating tangible evidence.
After initially entering a not guilty plea to every charge, the defendant acknowledged guilt on the first day of his trial regarding the charges of abusing a corpse and fabricating tangible evidence.
Brooks stated, “Adam is not an innocent. He and Kayla covered up Harmony’s death. He’s not an innocent here. He and Kayla moved Harmony’s body from place to place to keep it hidden. And Adam is not an innocent here."
He went on to say, "He and Kayla put her body in a shower to wash her remains of the fluids of decomposition and then permanently hid her remains. You can and should find him guilty of those crimes.”
Kayla Montgomery lied about working at Dunkin' Donuts
The defense intends to portray Kayla Montgomery, the state's main witness in Adam's trial, as a complete liar who stands to gain her freedom if she lies to the jury once more about what happened to Harmony on the day she vanished in late 2019.
“Kayla was willing to sing for her supper,” Brooks argued. “Not for truth. Not for Harmony. But for Kayla. Kayla was all about protecting herself to wiggle out of accountability for her own conduct," Brooks said.
Kayla lied about working a shift at Dunkin' Donuts on the day she last claimed to have seen her stepdaughter alive during her grand jury testimony in the investigation into Harmony's death and disappearance.
Later, employment records revealed the falsity of that claim. In exchange for a plea deal wherein prosecutors dropped several other charges against her in exchange for her testimony against her estranged husband, Kayla Montgomery later admitted to perjury.
"It was explained to Kayla that she could choose not to answer a question if it could incriminate her," according to Brooks, describing the events in which Kayla lied about where she was.
“Instead, though, she chose to lie. Under oath. The same oath you’ll see her take later.”
Kayla Montgomery claims her husband killed Harmony by beating her
The state has framed Adam Montgomery's witness tampering as the reason behind Kayla Montgomery's known lies, which include lying about when she last saw Harmony during two police interviews.
Kayla Montgomery now says that on December 7, 2019, her husband killed the girl by beating her. Harmony is said to have had a "bathroom accident" while the family of five was living in a Chrysler Sebring after they had been recently evicted. This allegedly set off the incident.
The state asserts that the precise location of the Chrysler Sebring was a Burger King parking lot.
However, the defense claimed Harmony had died a few days earlier. One evening, Adam Montgomery "stood by" his wife when he got home from work.
The husband and wife "discovered Harmony's cold, lifeless body" behind the apartment building where they had parked their car that evening.
“Kayla made Adam feel responsible,” Brooks said. “She claimed not to know what happened. It was Adam’s fault for everything they were going through. It was not her fault, she insisted."
"She thought all the kids were asleep. He had to protect her. He had to protect their children. If anyone found out, their children would be taken.”
The defense lawyer claimed that although the two had agreed to conceal the girl's death, they were at a loss about what to do.
State's prosecution has charged Kayla Montgomery
At the state's opening statement earlier on Thursday morning, the prosecution described the sequence of events that transpired as Harmony's body was, over the course of several months, dismembered and disposed of in a particularly graphic manner.
Kayla Montgomery was ultimately imprisoned for a small charge associated with Harmony's disappearance and the subsequent investigation. Kayla was taken into custody "pursuant to an arrest warrant for one charge of Welfare Fraud, a class A felony," in January 2022.
Her charges include failing to remove Harmony Montgomery from her family account with the public assistance agency and continuing to collect food stamp benefits for Harmony even though she was no longer living with Kayla and her husband, in order to obtain $1,500 in food stamp benefits illegally between December 2019 and June 2021.
Soon after, there was a formal indictment regarding those charges of theft. This development was presented by the defense as crucial.
Brooks informed the jury, "She knew that the police thought she had information about what happened to Harmony. And she knew that the walls were closing in. Kayla also knew that pointing the finger at Adam was worth something.”
As the only adult witness to Harmony's horrific death, Kayla Montgomery was portrayed by the state in their opening statement as a submissive wife who was scared and physically assaulted into lying by her husband out of fear for her own life.
Defense claims Kayla Montgomery is not credible witness
To refute those claims made by the state, the defense lawyer took several minutes to go through a note that was allegedly written by Kayla Montgomery and recovered from her jail cell.
“She writes of her willingness to, quote, ‘betray Adam,’ not to finally be free of Adam, not to finally be safe from him, not to tell the truth,” Brooks said.
“To betray. Meaning: stab him in the back. But she also wrote of her longing to be alone with him — one more time. To kiss. To make love if she could. She didn’t write of fearing to be alone with him."
"She did not write of any fear that Adam would hurt or kill her for her betrayal. In her fairy tale musings, Adam would understand and protect her until the end. Their children needed their mother.”
All of this suggests that Kayla Montgomery is not a credible witness, the defense claims, and as Brooks cited in several other pieces of evidence that will be discussed during the trial.
"Is the witness pulling from a well of true memory? Or just making it up?”
The defense lawyer will seek to remind the jurors about these questions when the state's key witness testifies.
