Adam Montgomery claimed he ‘missed’ daughter after allegedly beating her to death
Montgomery’s defence has alleged that Harmony died under the care of her stepmother Kayla Montgomery
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Adam Montgomery told a friend how much he missed his five-year-old daughter Harmony – despite him having violently beaten her to death months earlier, a court heard.
Montgomery’s murder trial is currently underway in Manchester, New Hampshire, more than four years after Harmony was last seen alive in 2019. Harmony’s disappearance went unreported for two years, until her mother Crystal Sorey’s desperate pleas to authorities to help look for her daughter prompted an investigation in late 2021.
During his trial, jurors have heard how Montgomery allegedly beat his daughter to death in December 2019, after she soiled herself.
Tarah Hilbert, the building manager at the Union Street apartment where Montgomery, his estranged wife Kayla Montgomery and their two infant sons lived after Harmony was killed, took the stand on Friday.
Ms Hilbert told jurors that she befriended the Montgomerys six months after they moved to the building complex in 2020, and often spent time with Kayla and the boys.
She then recounted a conversation in which Montgomery told her he had a daughter who lived with her mother in Lowell, Massachusetts.
“He said he had a daughter named Harmony and he hadn’t seen her in a couple of years because her mother had taken her,” Ms Hilbert said.
It is unclear when exactly the exchange took place, but it was at least eight months after Harmony was killed.
During cross-examination, defence attorney Caroline Smith brought up the context in which Montgomery volunteered that information.
“That conversation came up sort of the topic of him missing her, and you asked, ‘Well, where is she?’” Ms Smith asked. “And he said Lowell, Mass.”
Ms Hilbert agreed that this was correct.
Ms Hilbert also testified about an incident where, shortly before the Montgomerys were evicted from the building in 2021, she drove Kayla Montgomery, her sons and newborn daughter to a hotel after she was badly beaten by Montgomery.
“Adam had beat her pretty bad,” Ms Hilbert said through tears. “Really bad, her eyes, her nose.”
Throughout the trial, prosecutors have introduced evidence about the horrific ways in which Montgomery worked to destroy Harmony’s remains before disposing of what was left of the little girl at an unknown location in March 2020.
The defence has sought to argue that Harmony actually died in the care of her stepmother Kayla Montgomery and that Montgomery only went along with plans to conceal the body to “protect” his family.
Harmony’s remains have never been found.