Betty Gore

Case background and investigation

Betty Gore, 30, lived in Wylie, Texas. She was killed at her home on Friday, June 13, 1980. According to the Wikipedia article on the case and reporting by Oxygen, she was struck 41 times with a wood-splitting axe.

Suspicion turned to Candace "Candy" Montgomery, a friend of Gore's and an active member of a local church. Montgomery had had an affair with Gore's husband, a fact that became central to the trial. According to Wikipedia, Montgomery was taken into custody on June 26, 1980, and Wylie police charged her with murder.

Montgomery pleaded not guilty and stood trial in McKinney in the fall of 1980. She did not dispute that she had struck Gore with the axe. Her defense was that she had acted to protect herself: as Oxygen summarized her testimony, the two women were talking about the affair when Gore picked up an axe and became violent. Newsweek reported that Montgomery had undergone hypnosis sessions with a psychiatrist, Dr. Fred Fason, before giving her account in court. Newsweek also reported testimony that Gore was still alive when 40 of the 41 blows were delivered.

The trial lasted eight days, according to Wikipedia. On October 30, 1980, a jury of nine women and three men deliberated for a little more than three hours and found Montgomery not guilty. The acquittal ended the criminal case, and the sources reviewed describe no other person being charged in connection with Gore's death.

The verdict was poorly received by many in the community. Wikipedia describes a crowd outside the courthouse shouting at Montgomery as she left, and quotes Gore's father as saying that the family did not know what had happened and never would. Oxygen reported that the case split Wylie, where a number of fellow church members had supported Montgomery. Newsweek reported that Montgomery and her husband moved to Georgia after the trial and later divorced, and that she has kept out of public view.

The case has been retold several times on screen. Wikipedia lists the 1990 CBS television film A Killing in a Small Town, the 2022 Hulu series Candy, starring Jessica Biel, and the 2023 HBO Max series Love & Death, starring Elizabeth Olsen. Renewed attention from these productions has not changed the legal status of the case: Betty Gore's death was a homicide for which the person tried was acquitted on grounds of self-defense.