A recently unsealed document has provided crucial details about the police investigation into the alleged death of Harmony Montgomery, a 5-year-old girl from New Hampshire whose disappearance in 2019 garnered national attention. The document, a 48-page probable cause statement, was released on Tuesday following a motion by WMUR-TV in Manchester and reveals the disturbing series of events leading up to Harmony’s fatal beating by her father, Adam Montgomery, on December 7, 2019, as well as the methods he allegedly used to conceal her body. Montgomery has already been found guilty of unrelated charges, but he has pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder, falsifying evidence, abuse of a corpse, and witness tampering in connection with his daughter’s death. The girl’s body has never been recovered. The attorney for Montgomery did not respond to requests for comment.
According to court documents, Montgomery took custody of Harmony in July 2018 after her mother, Crystal Sorey, lost custody due to substance abuse issues. Over the following year, the Manchester Police Department received numerous calls from concerned neighbors about the well-being of Harmony and her siblings.
The affidavit includes statements from Kayla Montgomery, Adam’s wife at the time, who stated that the family was evicted from their home in November 2019 and forced to live in their car. Kayla revealed that Adam became extremely upset when Harmony failed to inform him about her need to use the restroom, resulting in frequent accidents in the car. Kayla claimed that Adam would respond to these accidents by hitting Harmony in the head with a closed fist. On the fateful day of December 7, 2019, as Adam drove the family to Burger King, Harmony had an accident and Adam repeatedly struck her over the course of a few minutes. Kayla reported that after the final strike, Adam expressed concern that he had severely harmed Harmony. In the aftermath, Harmony moaned for approximately five minutes before ceasing to breathe. Adam then placed her body in a duffle bag, which remained in the trunk of their car, occasionally brought out into the snow to delay decomposition.
Two years later, on November 18, 2021, Harmony was reported missing by her mother, Crystal Sorey, who had spent the previous year attempting to locate her daughter. Kayla initially claimed that she had last seen Harmony in late 2019 and believed that the girl had returned to her mother. When questioned by investigators, Adam showed no reaction to the news of his daughter’s disappearance and refused to provide further information, stating, “Either arrest me or I’m leaving.” He was subsequently arrested on January 4, 2022.
In June 2022, Kayla Montgomery, who had been charged with perjury for lying to the police about her whereabouts when Harmony was last seen, entered into a plea deal. She was sentenced to 18 months in prison and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors in Adam’s case. Kayla disclosed to investigators that after Harmony’s death, her body had been moved to various locations, including a red cooler that was taken to Kayla’s mother’s apartment. However, Kayla’s mother claims not to have known the contents of the cooler. The body was later hidden in a trash bag in the ceiling of a shelter where the family sought refuge. Detectives discovered a stain and a smell of decomposition during a search of the shelter’s ceiling area. Adam then relocated the body to a plastic bin, a tote bag, and finally a refrigerator at the Portland Pie Co., where he was employed temporarily. In March 2020, a friend of Adam’s helped him move the body once again, using a rented U-Haul truck.
Adam Montgomery is scheduled to stand trial in November.
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