Harmony Montgomery: Man convicted of killing 5-year-old daughter sentenced to 56 years to life

MANCHESTER, N.H. — A judge sentenced the father of Harmony Montgomery to at least 56 years in state prison after a jury found him guilty earlier this year of second-degree murder and other charges in the 5-year-old girl’s death, WFXT reported.

>> Read more trending news

The sentence matched the one sought by prosecutors, who said in court Thursday that Adam Montgomery repeatedly lied about his daughter’s death and has refused to say where her body was left.

“He beat Harmony the night before, and the morning of, and time and time again as he drove from the methadone clinic to Burger King, and he beat her to death and then covered her up to suffer and die in the car while he ate his food,” New Hampshire Senior Assistant General Ben Agati said during Montgomery’s sentencing hearing. He later called the 34-year-old “an unapologetic murderer of his own child.”

In court, he asked for Montgomery to share where authorities could find Harmony’s body, saying that the state was willing to revise its recommended sentence down to the minimum of 35 years.

Adam Montgomery did not respond, a silence that Agati took as “yet another reason why the minimum should not apply.”

“Harmony died in pain and in fear under a blanket, and nobody deserves that, especially a 5-year-old child,” he said.

Defense attorney Caroline Smith called the offer “a stunt” aimed at getting a response from Montgomery.

“Mr. Montgomery does not have to express remorse here for something where he maintains his innocence,” she said. “It would violate his Constitutional rights against self-incrimination.”

She asked that Montgomery face a lower sentence, though she declined to give a number because her client has maintained his innocence.

“Adam Montgomery did not kill his daughter, but when he discovered his daughter’s death, he broke, and he did inexplicable things,“ she said. “Even he can’t explain his actions.”

Earlier, Montgomery’s attorneys acknowledged that he was guilty of having “purposely and unlawfully removed, concealed or destroyed” Harmony’s corpse and falsifyng physical evidence, WFXT reported. In February, he was also convicted of second-degree murder, assaulting Harmony in 2019 and tampering with a key prosecution witness: his estranged wife Kayla Montgomery.

Kayla Montgomery testified at trial that Harmony’s body was hidden in the trunk of a car, a cooler, a ceiling vent and a workplace freezer before Adam disposed of it, according to WFXT. In a victim impact statement read in court, she said Harmony died because of Adam Montgomery’s “anger and hitting her so many times.”

With shaking hands, Harmony’s mother, Crystal Sorey, addressed Adam Montgomery in court, calling him “insecure and paranoid,” cowardly and “just plain evil.”

“You were supposed to protect her, yet you did the opposite,” she said, adding, “I wish you nothing but pain and misery for the rest of your pathetic life, and with or without you, we will find my daughter.”

She remembered Harmony as “beautiful inside and out, funny, smart, sassy, loving and, most of all, kind.”

“She lit up a room when she walked in,” she said. “She made a mark wherever she went, and you couldn’t stand it.”

Harmony’s aunt, Brittany Sorey, remembered talking to Adam Montgomery just after Harmony was born. He was in prison at the time, she said, and scared because of how badly he wanted to be a good dad.

“I believed in you and reminded you how good you were with my daughter, that you would be the best dad and not to worry. I couldn’t even believe how wrong I actually was,” she said. “You are a monster, Adam.”

She called him ”selfish, evil, conniving (and a) poor excuse for a human being.”

“I hope you sit in prison every day while she haunts you day and night until it’s unbearable, because that’s what you deserve,” she said.

Several other people who spoke Thursday in court, including the adoptive parents of Harmony’s little brother Jamison and the family who served as her foster parents, asked that Adam Montgomery be given the maximum sentence.

“Adam is hateful and selfish and continues to be so by not telling us where her body is,” said Michelle Rafferty, who was Harmony’s foster mother for 44 months of her life. “Adam knew he could have brought Harmony back to us. He had options but always chose himself each time. He never put Harmony first. There are consequences for his actions and he will have to live with them for the rest of his life.”

Investigators believe that Harmony was killed in December 2019, when she was 5 years old and living with Montgomery, WFXT reported. She wasn’t reported missing until two years later.

Her body has not been found.

© 2024 Cox Media Group