Mary Shieler Cybersexed Brian Barrett to Death
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Many visitors find this blog due to documentaries run on MSNBC and similar. This is an older story, but feel free to share your thoughts here. The remainder of the article is below as it was written in 2007
Mary Shieler of Oak Hill, West Virginia, is a married mother of two. She is in her forties, pudgy and by all definitions, a house frau.
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Mary used her daughter’s online identity to seduce two men online, both of whom worked at the same factory outside Buffalo New York. She turned the men against each other and one of them gunned the other down in cold blood.
Tom Montgomery killed Brian Barrett in a jealous rage over a stupid cyber love triangle.
Now one man is dead, the other is in jail for 20 years, leaving a broken and humiliated family behind, and Mary Shieler is a free woman.
Everyone in this sad tale helped to bring about this tragic end to Brian Barrett’s life at the age of 22. Mary posed as a hot 18 year old and used cybersex to seduce Tom Montgomery, 48, who was pretending to be a hot, disturbed Iraq War marine online. When Tom’s true identity was outed by his own wife, an angry Mary enlisted the help of Brian Barrett, Tom’s coworker, to use Mary’s passwords to her chat accounts to hound and humiliate Tom online. And when the rivalry grew intense, Tom shot and killed Brian.
From the SFGate here:
A 48-year-old man entangled in an Internet love triangle built largely on lies was sentenced Tuesday to 20 years in prison for killing his rival for the affection of a woman he had never met.
Thomas Montgomery, who posed as an 18-year-old Marine in online chats, pleaded guilty in August to gunning down Brian Barrett, 22, in a parking lot at the suburban Buffalo factory where they worked.
The motive was jealousy, investigators said. Both were involved online with a middle-aged West Virginia mother — who herself was posing as an 18-year-old student.
Prosecutor Frank Sedita argued for the maximum sentence of 25 years, describing Montgomery’s “almost predatory” pursuit of the woman and his resentment of Barrett when she cooled to Montgomery’s advances after 1 1/2 years and thousands of pages of Internet chats.
Montgomery began chatting with the woman, identified in court as Mary Shieler, in 2005. Occasionally, the woman would mail packages to his home. When one of the packages was intercepted by Montgomery’s wife, she wrote back, telling Shieler her husband’s true age and saying he was married.
Barrett, whom Montgomery had mentioned in his exchanges, was drawn into the triangle after Shieler contacted him online to confirm what she had been told by Montgomery’s wife.
This story makes it sound pretty cut and dry. To read all the sordid details, check out this Wired story. It is very detailed, including the bits that Mary didn’t want her real name used because she was supposedly an upstanding citizen. Her daughter, Jessi, was quoted in the paper several times during her school’s girls basketball championship run.
But Mary Shieler remains a free woman, which is somehow, grossly unfair. She committed aggravated identity theft to torment an unstable married man to the point that he murdered another man! How self absorbed and vacuous can a bitch be? She sounds just like the neighbors who drove a young girl to suicide by creating a fake profile on Myspace.
I completely agree with Jaw444. It’s very creepy the way the story is being slanted to vent all somewhat rightous anger at the mother, but barely any responsibility held to the guy who actually shot the gun and committed murder. weird.
talhotblond team–that’s what i thought. There are no laws against what she did, or what Tom did, other than the murder.
and i agree, the only person with a cause of action for a civil suit is jessi, her mother stole her identity and damaged her reputation, and perhaps other damages.
Farmgirl and talhotblond team–it appeared in the film that Mary was lower middle class. no job. lower working class neighborhood. i don’t think anyone would be able to collect much from her, thus, it would probably be impossible to find an attorney to take a civil case, if this impression that Mary has no resources is true.
What Mary did was offensive. I was also offended by what Tom was doing to ‘jessi,’ before i knew she was Mary. I am not more offended by what Mary did than by what Tom did, as far as their mutual tormenting game goes. The heartbreak for me was the death of poor Brian and the loss to his family and friends, and it’s Tom I hold solely responsible. Other than that, what they both did appeared like mirror images to me, so i didn’t hold one more responsible than the other for all their lies and depravation, and indeed, there are no laws against what they did, in their state at least.
But in the death of Brian, Mary has received a pretty severe punishment in that she lost her daughter and her husband. That is a very fitting punishment. To lose a family is a terrible thing. And the film, talhotblond brought her deeds into the light of public attention. If the film gets the attention it deserves in the future, this too is a fitting punishment. Her nightmare has just begun to the extent the film is widely seen. It should be shown in theaters and nominated for an academy award in the documentary category, imo.
I would guess mary has changed her name and appearance by now.
I just saw this on 20/20 also; I’m utterly shocked as a parent all the way around. Mary’s going to college, probably for job-training and will have an income one day.
I’d sue for wrongful death also, as the poster above suggested, just to get a big fat judgement that would follow her around for the rest of her life.
So if she tried to buy a house or other pleasures of life that Brian will NEVER get, the judgement would stop that as she won’t be able to be financed for any significant loans.
God bless all the innocent victims of these pukes.
I think the emotional outrage directed more towards Mary and not as much towards Tom stems from the fact that Mary is walking around free, while Tom has been served justice and is sitting in jail for his crime. It’s the sense of unfairness that fuels the outrage.
there’s a visceral sense that Mary is responsible for Bryan’s death and should be punished through the legal system, yet if that were possible, it would’ve been done. It seems highly likely that Brian’s parents would sue her if there were any basis to do it and any potential reward. A civil attorney’s time is worth hundreds per hour, and a case takes countless hours to prepare and fight. Even if Mary gets a job, even if she gets a college degree somewhere down the line, she is never going to be worth the kind of money that an attorney would need to make as their percentage of a civil award. This is why in similar situations, people sue corporations instead of individuals. In this case, the company that provides the chat rooms might theoretically be sued profitably, if there were laws permitting that. There are some laws governing child porn and exploitation but i don’t know that there are any governing what Mary and Tom did. Perhaps laws will evolve to govern the degree to which companies providing chat room services are responsible for what goes on in them, and then people such as Brian’s parents might have a lawsuit. If Mary were to publish a book about the experience (she would tell the story from a different perspective than the one presented in the film) and if she were to profit from the tragedy in that way, then it might be worthwhile for an attorney. If there were a legal basis for a civil action, which i don’t know, i wonder what the statute of limitations would be. I would like to read some legal opinions on this case.
fyi, the victim’s family did sue Montgomery and Mary Shieler and the Dynabrade factory – all civil suits. The Dynabrade suit was settled, and the Barrett’s won the other cases – but Mary has no assets (if she makes any money in the future, they would be entitled to it) and Montgomery is prohibited by law from profiting off this story.
to HMM: EXACTLY right. there’s a great discussion about this feeling on our facebook fanpage- ‘talhotblond’
to Jaw 444 – thanks for that. One of the main reasons we did the film was because the mother was not held responsible in any way. As one great comment on the fan page put it, “If I kick my dog til he bites me, who’s really at fault.”
Just watched the 20/20 story. Hey, at least talhotblond wasn’t a guy. Can you imagine? What’s next a made-for-TV-movie on Lifetime/LMN?
Give me a break. Shieler’s deeds were crazy, both chatting these men up AND using her daughter’s identity, but there was zero intent on her part to encourage someone to murder someone else. There is a degree of negligence, but a small one, given that most people just DON’T MURDER other people no matter how jealous they get – so she would have no reason to believe that was at all likely to happen here. The eventual indirect consequences of her little game do not mean that she is culpable in the same way or to the same degree as the person who MURDERED THE VICTIM.
Say for the sake of argument that the daughter WAS the one sending all the messages. We would be saying it was reckless, wrong, and maybe a little crazy for her to play these men off of each other but we would not be blaming her for one man’s murder of the other. In the mother, we have reckless, wrong, and definitely crazy given the added element of it being her own daughter she was impersonating – BUT THE MURDER STILL WAS NOT HER FAULT any more than it would have been the daughter’s fault if she HAD really been “Tallhotblonde.”
see the facebook fanpage/ talhotblond for heated discussions about this topic, about 15 posts in
True, the majority of the human race would not murder because of jealousy or any other reason, but, she kept this charade going and going, knowing the state that Montgomery was in, so she is just as responsible, the only thing she is not guilty of, is pulling the trigger.W hat she did to her daughter, was immoral, setting her up, like a human target for preditors.
being from Buffalo, i can’t believe i didn’t hear about this when it first happened. albeit, obviously, i don’t watch the news religiously; but it definitely didn’t get the airtime that it should have, in order to get the message out there. however, thanks to talhotblond team, it finally is.
even though this horrific case involved adults, it should especially serve as a wake up call for those who are (sane) parents of tweens and teens…
whenever i tell other parents that i monitor my teen’s online activity, most are repulsed, saying “i’d NEVER invade my child’s privacy – besides which, i don’t need to – because i *trust* MY child.”
sure, i trust my teen, too – to a certain extent, that is. for i certainly don’t trust *any* kid to make the same decisions that a (sane, responsible) *adult* would. even more important, i don’t trust OTHERS online *at all*. as this very sad tale illustrates all too-well, one can never be sure who they are communicating with.
so, if by monitoring your child’s online activity to keep them safe you’re “invading their privacy”, i’m guilty as charged.
This bitch should be locked up she started the whole idiotic game…I hope she cant live with her self…
Jaw jaw, I just watched the documentary and i am furious with Mary. Tom said he will spill blood way before it happened and certainly if she was with him again,meaning Brain. She was a grown women- 47 years old. Log off and call the police do not add petrol to an already hot fire. So my blood is boiling with anger over Mary and I think Brains parents feel the same way.
Tom is no victim either and got what he deserves 20 years, i feel it should have been doubled. I am too angry with Mary to think about Tom yet( who did the unthinkable and forgivable) but Mary I think she kept pushing knowing tom was unstable and at the edge ( in fact hanging on by a finger). And the programming team confirm this.
yrellim, you’re an illiterate moron. Did you ever attend school?
The bottom line is———if mary hadn’t of started this, it would have never happened. I am not excuseing Montgomery in any way but she kept it going and going.
Vey surprised that someone has not went after her and bloodied her.
jackled and marion–what do you mean when you say mary “started the whole thing?’ i can’t remember how it started now. I remember Tom went into a chat room and mary/”jessi” was there and they started chatting and flirting but i don’t remember the details. How did Mary start it? my impression of her, narcissistic person that she is, is that she doesn’t have a problem living with herself. I would guess she has changed her appearance and her name.
To jaw444
Sorry, I cannot remember quite how it started but she started her charade from day one and kept it going, still continueing, even though she knew that Tom was over the edge and making threats toward Brian, even saying to her that he was going to kill Brian.
Tomis in prison but she’s walking scott free. Tom is definitely not a victim.
Ok, here are some thoughts:
1. She not only played the 2 off of each other, but she went in chatrooms, etc with Brain – both of them poking fun @ Tom. She didn’t need to mention killing him. She used jealousy & anger on an unstable pervert to make him mad @ Brian. She actually helped make them mad @ each other. Just shows that Brian was more stable or he might have killed Tom… She most definitly had an equal hand in this. Now, does that excuse Tom? NO!! Just means she should be doing EQUAL time.
2. Something else that people have seemed to miss is that she endangered her own child by putting her out there to be raped or taken, or killed, or whatever when she used her daughter’s pics & madeup words in such a sleezy manner. Disgusting!!
3. Then there’s the fact that once she found out Tom’s age, she claimed she continued to chat w/him to keep him from chatting up other young girls – to keep them safe (too bad she didn’t care as much about her own daughter’s safety!), but is that not exactly what she was doing w/Brian? She’s just as disgusting as he is on that!
That’s okay though. Karma’s a real b**ch!
saw444,
She warned Brian & THEN they both went into chat rooms & made fun of Tom. She DID talk to Tom again, it just took a few weeks for her to change her mind & start back up again. She more than should have known at that point that they were all playing w/fire, but she needed more ego strokes that Tom could provide – especially since Brian was pushing to meet in person & she could soooo not do that.
All I can say is, I would fuck them Both!! Ohhhh I almost left out, “Tall Hot Hooker”—I’d hit it!! Hell, I’m from WV and I would nail a chicken in the DARK!! Wanna Chat?? I’m half-QUEER, full blooded GOAT RAMMER, and eat chicken PUSSY, but I’m known as the “CAMDEN PARK SNATCHER”!!! I pull my nutz outta my pants and paint them like eggs and hide in da bushes during EASTER at Camden Park—-Haha Im fucking sick–OHH JUST JOKIN YOU FUCKUPS OUT IN THE WORLD!! F-U ALL SICK-O’s!!
I’ve read through a lot of the comments, agree and disagree. The crux of the case is that any person who, by the very nature of their actions or inactions, either coerces another person or does nothing at all when it is obvious that that other person is becoming a danger to themselves or another party……should become culpable for the action they choose. I followed the case thoroughly and there was a point when “Jessi” aka Mary Shieler could have said to herself ENOUGH is ENOUGH, and she did not, in fact when Tom Montgomery told her he was going to eliminate Brian, she just said “oh” Is she a poor suburban house frau, just bored? No, she is an evil calculating bitch, even taking and posting inappropriate pics of her own daughter to probably more than those two men…I hope one day she will pay.
Hello,
incredible story
A show is aired on tv here in Belgium
Brian, rest in peace