Plea deal reached for Harmony Montgomery's stepmother
MANCHESTER, N.H. - The stepmother of a New Hampshire girl who vanished in 2019 at age 5 and is presumed dead plans to plead guilty to unrelated perjury charges and agree to cooperate with prosecutors, who charged her estranged husband with second-degree murder in Harmony Montgomery's death, according to a document filed in court Wednesday.
Other charges against Kayla Montgomery, 32, would be dropped, according to the agreement in Hillsborough County Superior Court.
Prosecutors are recommending that she serve a two-year jail sentence and the rest of her time be suspended. She's scheduled for a plea-and-sentencing hearing Friday. A judge would need to approve the agreement.
Montgomery has been in and out of jail this year. Under the plea agreement, prosecutors would drop charges that she lied to state health officials about having Harmony Montgomery in her care in order to collect welfare benefits and receiving stolen firearms.
The perjury charges allege that she lied to a county grand jury about the location of a prior job and the time of a prior shift in 2019.
Harmony was reported missing in New Hampshire at the end of 2021 but she has not been seen since 2019 when she was five years old. Her father, Adam Montgomery, is accused of causing Harmony's death by repeatedly striking her with a closed fist. He pleaded not guilty to killing Harmony, falsifying physical evidence and abuse of a corpse.