Manchester Police Public Information Officer Heather Hamel holds two missing person posters in January in Manchester, N.H., that show missing girl Harmony Montgomery. John Tlumacki/The Boston Globe via Associated Press
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 husband with second-degree murder in the child’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.
Her estranged husband, Adam Montgomery, pleaded not guilty to killing Harmony, falsifying physical evidence and abuse of a corpse.
Authorities didn’t know Harmony was missing until last year.
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