MANCHESTER, N.H. — (AP) â A New Hampshire man was convicted of second-degree murder Thursday in the death of his 5-year-old daughter, who police believe was killed nearly two years before she was reported missing in 2021 and whose body was never found.
Adam Montgomery, 34, did not attend the trial and wasn’t present when jurors returned their verdict. He had proclaimed his innocence, saying in court last year in an unrelated case that he loved Harmony Montgomery “unconditionally.”
âI am grateful to the judge, jury, and Department of Justice for delivering justice for Harmony,” New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu said in a statement. “Adam Montgomery is a monster and deserves to spend the rest of his life in prison.â
Adam Montgomery’s attorneys earlier acknowledged his guilt on two lesser charges, that he âpurposely and unlawfully removed, concealed or destroyedâ her corpse and falsified physical evidence, but said he didnât kill his daughter. The jury also convicted him of assaulting Harmony Montgomery in 2019 and of tampering with the key prosecution witness, his estranged wife and stepmother of his daughter, Kayla Montgomery.
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Investigators believe Harmony Montgomery was slain in December 2019, though she wasn’t reported missing for almost two years. Kayla Montgomery testified that the body was hidden in the trunk of a car, a cooler, a ceiling vent and a workplace freezer before Adam Montgomery disposed of it.
Defense attorney James Brooks deferred comment to Caroline Smith, the main attorney representing Adam Montgomery. She did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Adam Montgomery had custody of the girl. Her mother, Crystal Sorey, who was no longer in a relationship with him, said the last time she saw Harmony Montgomery was during a video call in April 2019. She eventually went to police, who announced they were looking for the missing child on New Yearâs Eve 2021.
Photos of the girl were widely circulated on social media. Police eventually determined she had been killed.
âIâm relieved that thereâs some justice being served,â Sorey told WMUR-TV on Thursday. âObviously, itâs not over. I have a little bit of peace knowing that heâs being held accountable because he thought he was so untouchable and that she didnât matter, that nobody would miss her. He was so wrong, he was so wrong.â
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She said she still wants to find the remains of her daughter so she can finally bring her home.
âWeâve still got to find her,â police Chief Allen Aldenberg said Thursday. âThis girl deserves better than the life she had.â
Harmony Montgomery’s case has exposed weaknesses in child protection systems and provoked calls to prioritize the well-being of children over parents in custody matters. Harmony was moved between the homes of her mother and her foster parents multiple times before Adam Montgomery received custody in 2019 and moved to New Hampshire.
âI still firmly believe that some people in some other agencies need to be held accountable. And Iâm asking for that,â Aldenberg said, referring to child welfare officials in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. “This little 5-year-old girl, she deserves somebody to be held accountable that failed along the way because we wouldnât be standing here today if other people had done their job.â
Kayla Montgomery is serving an 18-month prison sentence after pleading guilty to perjury charges related to the investigation into the child’s disappearance and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors. She testified that that her husband killed Harmony Montgomery on Dec. 7, 2019, while the family lived in their car after being evicted from their home.
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Kayla Montgomery testified that her husband repeatedly punched Harmony Montgomery in the face and head because he was angry that she was having bathroom accidents in the car.
The couple noticed the girl was dead hours later when the car broke down, at which time Adam Montgomery put her body in a duffel bag, Kayla Montgomery had testified.
For the next three months, she testified, Adam Montgomery moved the body from container to container and place to place. According to his wife, the locations included the trunk of a friendâs car, a cooler in the hallway of his mother-in-lawâs apartment building, the ceiling vent of a homeless shelter and a workplace freezer.
Lead detective John Dunleavy said Thursday that while he considered the conviction a win, it did not feel complete since Harmony Montgomery was still missing.
âWe didnât find her,â he said. “I will be on the job for some time, I still have about 15 years left. And as long as Iâm a police officer, Iâm going to continue to look for her.â
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Prosecutor Benjamin Agati said at a news conference that the trial does not end the search for the girl. He said that after analyzing the mileage Adam Montgomery took with the rental truck into Massachusetts, there are about 26 miles (42 kilometers) that he could have covered where her remains might be.
âShe is somewhere along that route,â he said, pointing out previous searches in the Revere, Massachusetts, area. âThose are still our big areas of search.â
Agati said that when Montgomery is sentenced in the coming months, he should face a minimum sentence on the murder charge of 35 years to life, a tougher sentence because of his daughterâs young age. He said that would be consecutive with armed criminal charges for which he is already serving a minimum sentence of more than 33 years.
Asked if that meant Montgomery was never getting out of prison, the prosecutor said: âItâs a lot of time, and I hope Iâm not practicing at the time that that minimum date ever comes around.â
Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
WILTON, N.H. (WHDH) – A woman died in a Wilton, New Hampshire, house fire Wednesday morning, according to the New Hampshire State Fire Marshal’s Office.
At 9:08 a.m., Wilton firefighters responded to Burns Hill Road after a caller said their home was filling up with smoke. When they arrived, a single-family home was on fire and they found out two people were still inside on the second floor.
A man and a woman were both taken out of the house by firefighters and taken to Elliott Hospital. The woman was pronounced dead and the man is in serious condition.
Officials have not released the name of the victim at this time.
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At this time, investigators are looking into the cause of the fire and are trying to determine if a power outage in the area played a factor. The fire is not currently considered suspicious.
(Copyright (c) 2025 Sunbeam Television. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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Diane Durgin, 67, is accused of shooting at a Black man who inadvertently drove to her property after a prearranged truck part sale, prosecutors said.
A New Hampshire woman is accused of violating the state’s Civil Rights Act four times after she allegedly shot at a man because he was Black, prosecutors said.
Diane Durgin, 67, of Weare, N.H. could face up to a $5,000 fine for each violation she is found to have committed, the office of New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella said in a press release Tuesday.
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Durgin is also charged with criminal threatening against a person with a deadly weapon and attempted first degree assault with a deadly weapon, Michael Garrity, a media representative for the New Hampshire Attorney General, said in an emailed statement to Boston.com.
Durgin had a final pre-trial conference last week, Garrity said.
In a civil complaint filed Tuesday, Durgin is accused of threatening physical force against the victim, the AG said. Prosecutors asked the court to issue a preliminary injunction barring Durgin from repeating her alleged behavior and from contacting the victim and his family.
During the morning hours of Oct. 20, 2024, the victim claims, he “mistakenly” drove to Durgin’s home after a prearranged purchase of a truck part with a seller online, prosecutors wrote as part of their request for an injunction.
When the man — whom prosecutors identified in court documents as X.G. — arrived, Durgin allegedly stepped out of her home and approached his car with a gun “holstered by her waist,” prosecutors wrote.
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Upon noticing that X.G. was Black, Durgin allegedly “removed her gun and pointed it at X.G.,” prosecutors said in the injunction request.
While X.G. explained that he was lost, Durgin called the victim a “Black mother[expletive],” and threatened to “kill him,” prosecutors allege.
As the victim attempted to drive away, Durgin allegedly took her gun and fired two shots at the fleeing man’s car, missing both times, the AG’s office said.
While on the phone with a dispatcher, Durgin allegedly said she shot the man’s car because the victim is Black, the AG said.
“The guy is Black. And he, he…he says he’s meeting someone here and I think he’s coming here to steal,” Durgin allegedly said.
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Police located X.G. and brought him to the Weare Police Department, stopping along the way at the correct seller’s home to complete the truck part purchase, prosecutors wrote in court documents.
To prove a violation of the New Hampshire Civil Rights Act, the AG must show that Durgin “interfered or attempted to interfere with the rights of the victim to engage in lawful activities by threatening to engage in or actually engage in physical force or violence, when such actual or threatening conduct was motivated by race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, sexual orientation, sex, gender identity, or disability,” prosecutors said.
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:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/EXJALA6D4YFTNBJUEEDTWPYF74.jpg?ssl=1 "New Hampshire man convicted of killing daughter, 5, whose body has not been found")
