The Sneak Attack on Katlyn Lyon | Post Mortem | Forensic Files

Welcome to Postmortem. I'm your host, Ann Marie Green, and today we are discussing the case of 28-year-old
Caitlyn Lion Montgomery, [music] who was found unresponsive by her roommate in October of 2022.
when she later died of her injuries to her head and her neck at the hospital. The case evolved into a homicide
investigation and it sparked a social media fight for justice from her family. So joining me today is 48 hours
correspondent Aaron Morardi to uh talk about this case. Thank you Aaron. It's another tough one because um Caitlyn's
mother uh described her as glitter. She was such a loss. So it's a tough case to
discuss. All right, so let's get into this case. In the early morning hours of October
7th, 2022, Caitlyn McGomery was rushed to the hospital after her roommate, Jacob Piery, called 911. Now, and this
is a heartbreaking part of this. It was her four-year-old daughter who first alerted Jacob that her mom would not
wake up. But Caitlyn's home wasn't initially treated as a crime scene. And that's because first responders thought
that Caitlyn probably overdosed on drugs. At the hospital, doctors discovered the bruises around her neck.
So my question to you is, how did first responders miss this? How did they miss that there was a a possible
strangulation here? Amory, this was a new one for me because as it turns out, she had been so recently attacked that
those bruises didn't come out and they didn't see anything. And because she was unresponsive
and because she was young, they assumed she must have taken something. It must have been an overdose. And this case
really serves as a reminder, and I hear this all the time, of why every uh scene, death scene has to be treated
like a homicide. But the other side of this is, of course, that the first responders, you know, she was still
alive. Their priority was not that scene. They wanted to save her life. Yeah. And now that I'm talking it out
with you, I can count the number of times that I've maybe hit my thigh on a a table and said to myself, "Boy, that's
gonna bruise." And I know the bruise isn't going to pop up probably for another hour or so. And so when I think
about that, it makes sense that the bruises would not have been visible by the time um the first responders were
there. You're absolutely right. In fact, in many strangulation cases, I mean, there may be no bruises at all or they
may be internal and not show up on the outside. Um, and this was an attack that was very quick. Uh, she was probably
asleep, so there were no uh defensive uh wounds, but those bruises did become visible um at the hospital. And I
thought it was really interesting that actually those bruises helped a lot in terms of creating like a timestamp for
the attack. The fact that the bruises didn't immediately appear actually in a weird way helped the investigation
because it helped the lead investigator to determine approximately what time the
attack happened. And what they believe is that it happened about an hour before Jacob Piery called 911, which would make
it somewhere between 4 and 5 a.m. And that becomes very important during the trial.
>> Mhm. Do investigators know where Caitlyn's daughter, Melanie, was when the attack happened?
>> Oh, this is so sad. Yeah, she was in bed with her mother. Um hopefully she won't
have any memories if she saw any of it. She was just 4 years of age when this happened. Um but because she was there,
she was either awakened by it or awoke on her own right afterwards. And thank God that she ran to get Jacob because to
be honest, if she had not gotten Jacob right away, um those certainly the bruises would have appeared, but they
might not have been able to figure out exactly when she had been murdered. So after Caitlyn dies of her injuries,
investigators almost immediately zero in on Jacob Piery, her roommate. At one point, they actually tell Caitlyn's
family that they're 99% sure that it's Jacob. So, what made them sort of pivot from being 99% sure that it's the
roommate to looking at, well, what could that 1% be? >> Well, I mean, there's a a reason why
investigators first looked at Jacob Piery for one reason. He was the only other adult in the apartment. It was
Caitlyn, her daughter, and Jacob Piery. There is no sign of force entry. This was actually Jacob Piery's first night
living in the apartment. um he had just moved in the evening before she was attacked and they learned
that he had tried to ask Caitlyn out. Um and so they're thinking, you know, maybe
she spurned him. But on the other side of that, you know, he was so cooperative and handed over his phone right away and
wanted to do whatever he could to help out the investigation. And that just didn't fit with someone who was trying
to hide what he had done. And I should point out, they're also hearing from the family that there was somebody else that
the family suspected. But I have to tell you, they were looking hard at Jacob Piery and he knew it. He was scared. He
was >> Yeah. You know, I felt I felt for him, but he look he looks a little suspicious. the uh investigator, which I
thought really helped him. He before they really moved off of Jacob, he uh went back and listened to the 911 call
and you could hear that uh Jacob was trying to do what he could to save her life.
>> Right. >> So, it did make investigators finally look at somebody else. >> Right. And you mentioned that her family
was mentioning, "Hey, there is someone else you should look at." that investigators start looking at Caitlyn's
ex-boyfriend. His name is Trenton Fry. And he's got a motive because 10 days before the attack, she dumped him. She
had discovered that he was really kind of overplaying this idea that he was a successful businessman and he spun this
whole story about who he was and what he did for a living. And so she wastes no time. She breaks up with him. She blocks
him. Um, you know, Erin, the investigators and the prosecutor, they're really kind of characterizing
this as a case of domestic violence. I know you've covered many domestic violence cases. When women leave their
partners, they are particularly vulnerable. You know, I've covered too many of these
stories, Amarie. And if there's anything that uh viewers and listeners take away
from this story, I want it to be that. And that certainly seems to be the case in Caitlyn's case. Uh so Trenton Fry on
paper looked like the perfect guy. He had done a lot to promote this image of himself as the owner of a security
business and construction business. And he apparently according to the prosecution
um was very upset when Caitlyn held him accountable for the lies. you know, when
it turned out that he may have had those businesses, but he wasn't making any real money, he didn't have good credit,
>> and she was upending that image that he had created. >> Mhm. >> And there's one other, I think,
important point. We find out later that that Caitlyn wasn't the only woman in his life. He had other girlfriends.
>> You're kidding me. >> Yeah. No, it's true. And apparently um this fact that Caitlyn could walk away
so easily according to the prosecutor was enough to make him angry. >> See to me that's you know those one of
those red flags that this is not about love. This is about ownership. >> That's certainly what the prosecution
believes was the motive. So, you know, Fry, of course, tells investigators he wasn't anywhere close uh to Caitlyn when
this attack happened, that he was hours away. He was working in North Carolina. Um except they find some pretty solid
evidence that he wasn't. For one thing, they noticed that there were cell phone tower pings that occurred in Virginia
when he had told investigators he was in North Carolina. And those pings started
3 days before the attack. And then another interesting thing is that two of Caitlyn's neighbors saw an unfamiliar
man sitting outside the apartments. And one neighbor was so scared of this guy that she actually went home to her
parents. So he must have been sending off really creepy vibes. and the other person actually took a picture and it's
timestamped on October 6th, which is a day before she was attacked. Then we get to what investigators uncover with the
the browser history. They figure out that he's been actually looking at the layout of her apartment. And that is
very helpful because this is a case um where you have to wonder how did he get into the apartment? her apartment was on
the second floor. Um there wasn't like a fire escape or anything. So you're wondering that and how was someone able
to find her room so quickly, kill her, get out, and get away um in a very short period of time. So that layout really
mattered because it showed that he was trying to figure out where everybody was in the apartment and he had, as you
point out, Emory, those three days sitting out there. So, I think the prosecution's theory was that he was
outside looking where the lights were and could figure out where was her bedroom as opposed to Jacob Pierce's. I
do find kind of that part of the case challenging that he was able to slip in and slip out without anyone noticing,
without making noise, and there are dogs in the apartment. Amory, that was I had
the biggest problem with that because dogs bark at everything. Now, I understand why Caitlyn's dog might not
have barked because Caitlyn's dog knew Trent and Fry, but what troubled me was that there are also two dogs in the in
Jacob Piery's room. But the prosecutor says those dogs were in a closed room with Jacob. Jacob wasn't being
threatened and so there wasn't a reason for the dogs to bark. And the other thing is, you know, often it's very
difficult to disturb a scene without leaving something behind. And investigators found nothing that really
placed Fry inside Caitlyn's apartment. That is true. And that was the strongest argument that the defense leaned on at
trial. Um, but that scene was so contaminated by dogs and people and first responders and made it more
difficult for investigators later on. Now, the only real evidence that pointed to uh Trenton Fry being in the apartment
is this time when Trenton Fry's phone connects to Caitlyn's iPad, which is very damaging. And the prosecution uses
that to say he had to be in the apartment to make that connection. But what the defense argued was, how do you
know that iPad was actually in the apartment at that time? Because when Caitlyn's aunt came to the scene when
they first thought it was an overdose, uh, Aunt Sherry took the iPad home with her, and that's where investigators got
it. When investigators sort of confront Fry with the evidence that they have about allegedly being in Caitlyn's
apartment, he claims he has no memory of it. And he starts to talk about, you know, he has periods of of blacking out.
We've heard this before, Aaron and Amry, if we've heard it a lot. Think how often
the investigators have heard that. October 20th, 2022, Trenton Fry is charged with Caitlyn's murder and he
pleads not guilty. Now, before Trenton uh Fry's trial even began, um Caitlyn's mother, Crystal, her two aunts, Sherry
and Tina, they took to social media. They started posting videos on Tik Tok to talk about the case. And it's
definitely something that we've been seeing whether it's the families of victims wanting more attention on a case
um that hasn't been solved or wanting more attention on a suspect who has been charged.
I just did a a case involving Molly Bish and her sister used Tik Tok to try to get new tips and new evidence. So yes,
it's happening all the time. In this case though, as reporters, you really get a sense of what this family went
through in a way you couldn't any other way. Caitlyn's mother, Crystal, happens to have two sisters. And these women all
are very supportive of each other. And so when Crystal was having difficulty grappling with her pain and her loss,
her sisters come through and the way they support her is on TikTok and telling people what's happening and how
we have to have justice for uh Caitlyn. You know, they really were pushing for that. A lot of these videos really
brought Caitlyn to life. Like she pops off the screen. >> Oh, she does. Um, I often feel this, but
I felt this in particular in this case that I wish I had known Caitlyn Montgomery. Um, as I mentioned, her mom
called her glitter, and she does remind you of glitter. Uh, she was very adept at a dance called shuffling. I was not
familiar with that before I [clears throat] start on this story. It's this very very quick step dance um
that Caitlyn had learned from her brother. And remember, Caitlyn Montgomery was this tiny little thing.
And so really what you see when you see videos of her are just her little feet moving, moving, moving. And uh so she
does pop. >> Yeah. Um Trenton Fry also had support from his family. Trenton Fry, he has a
sister who clearly loves him and I think she felt she had to defend him if there
were all these Tik Toks pointing the finger at him. And so when the trial started, there were a lot of Tik Tok
videos that she produced to say, "Wait a minute, you know, maybe he didn't do it.
Here's why he didn't do it. Why are we looking at him?" He actually takes the stand in his own defense, which is, as
we've said, every time it happens, it's unusual. Despite the fact that it seems to happen more often than not on 48
hours, it's not it's not normal. >> It is not. You know, the general view of defense attorneys is you do not put your
client who's standing trial for murder on the stand. But what I've heard in this case is that this particular
attorney um often puts clients on the stand and he said to me that he felt in this case Trenton had to take the stand
that the jury needed to hear from him and Trenton Fry had to make that decision as well that he was the one who
would take the stand and he wanted to. The defense tried to raise doubt during the trial by suggesting that Jacob Piery
had had been the one who strangled Caitlyn because of some sort of consensual sex act that that went too
far. I understand the role of the defense. Um but I just kind of personally it felt a little icky to kind
of throw this out there. I have to agree with you Amory. um the defense often and certainly has the
right to raise reasonable doubt where the defense attorney feels it's best. What's wrong with that is the defense
knew that there was evidence that contradicted it. Um the medical examiner actually testified that there was no
evidence that she had had recent sexual activity. So, I was troubled that that would be raised because it probably
wasn't going to be enough to sway the jurors when there was no evidence of it and they heard that. But it did hurt the
family. >> Um, particularly Caitlyn's mother was so upset. And so, that one, oh, I struggle
with the defense has the right to do it, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's the right thing to do. Mhm. So, it
doesn't take the jury long to come to a conclusion here. They only uh deliberated for about an hour before
delivering the verdict. Trenton Fry was found guilty of firstdegree murder and and Caitlyn's death. Four months later,
they returned to court for Trenton Fry's sentencing. Aaron, you were there for the sentencing. What was it like in the
courtroom? Well, of course, I really wanted to go because the defendant might say something um uh accepting
responsibility or at least apologizing or something that might give some peace to family members. But in this case, he
accepted no responsibility for it. So, it upset I think people belonging to Caitlyn's family, but it really upset
the judge. And I think you need to hear it for yourself because um it really shows and explains
why the judge ended up sentencing him the way he did. >> This murder was as cold bloodooded,
premeditated, and calculated as any I've seen. The manner of death was strangulation.
Death was not instantaneous. The amount of terror, the amount of horror inflicted upon this young
innocent woman is unimaginable. Unimaginable to anyone, to everybody except you.
Because you were there. You saw it. you caused it. I hereby sentence you to imprisonment
for life because in my opinion a sentence for anything less would be less than what you justly deserve.
>> You could hear people responding in the courtroom. Um I think it was from both
sides. Um because I know that Caitlyn's family there were like tears, but there were tears on the part of Trenton Fry's
family too who um from all appearances and certainly they testified on his behalf support him. But this was a judge
who had been both a prosecutor and then a judge for 47 years and you would think
had seen everything. And this case really set him off as you can tell. >> I that gave me chills hearing it again.
>> Mhm. Um Milani, she is with Caitlyn's aunt now, but she's not Why is she not living with her grandmother? Caitlyn's
mom. Aunt Sherry has always been the mother hen of the family. She's the oldest of the three sisters. And uh she
had a very close relationship with uh Caitlyn and Milani. And so at this point she is raising uh Milani, but Crystal is
all good with that because she can see her granddaughter anytime she wants. And um and I think from the family's
perspective, they all have said this is definitely the right way to do it. And um and you could just see she is
blossoming as a child. And I think we have a little bit more sound about how she's doing.
>> There were moments in the beginning that, you know, it was heartbreaking, but we do everything we can to keep her
busy. And she's just a happy little girl. >> What does she call you? >> She calls me mama now. Mommy.
>> Was that hard for you at first? >> Yes, because I didn't want my sister to be upset because I didn't want her think
I was taking Milani from Caitlyn and erasing Caitlyn. And I'm not trying to do that, but how can I tell Milani not
to call me mama when I'm doing everything? You know, she's used to being with me. I was the first one to be
at the apartment to get her. And from that day on, it was like I've been her person. Um I res It's like I rescued her
and she has clung to me. She she feels safe with me. Um and the way we have it works for us.
This is a story of a wonderful, wonderful, warm family that lost a very important member and they are trying
[music] to get through it and make it the best they can for her daughter. It's it's inspiring and heartbreaking at the
same time. Um, Erin, it's always great talking to you. Thank you so much. Thanks, Amory.

48 Hours correspondents Erin Moriarty and Anne-Marie Green discuss the murder of Katlyn Lyon Montgomery and how her family turned to TikTok to demand justice.

Crime. Social justice. Impact. "48 Hours" investigates the most intriguing crime and justice cases that touch on all areas of the human experience including greed and passion. "48 Hours," which premiered in 1988, has developed a rich history of original reporting and impact journalism that has helped exonerate wrongly convicted people, caused cold cases to be reopened and solved, and along the way changed lives.

For video licensing inquiries, contact: licensing@veritone.com

Brief Summary

Caitlyn Lion Montgomery's murder investigation reveals domestic violence, suspect alibis, and a family's fight for justice through social media.

Key points

Caitlyn Lion Montgomery's Tragic Case. 28-year-old Caitlyn was found unresponsive, leading to a homicide investigation.
The Role of Social Media in Justice. Caitlyn's family used TikTok to seek justice and raise awareness about her case.
Trenton Fry's Trial and Sentencing. Trenton Fry was found guilty of Caitlyn's murder and sentenced to life in prison.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

Caitlyn's mother described her as glitter.

Describing Caitlyn's vibrant personality.

0:44WatchFeb 7, 2026

Tension

75/ 100High tension

More from 48 Hours

Solve the Crime

Read a real case one clue at a time, then see how your call held up against the investigators.