6. Dr. Fred Fason
Dr. Fred Fason was the psychologist and hypnotist who worked with Candy to uncover memories related to the incident.
Dr. Fred Fason, a Houston psychologist and hypnotist, became an unexpected centerpiece of Candy Montgomery’s 1980 murder trial. Brought in by defense attorney Don Crowder, he met with Candy several times under hypnosis to explore why she had attacked her friend Betty Gore. What emerged was a theory that her violent outburst was not planned but triggered by a buried childhood trauma.
Through taped hypnosis sessions, Fason guided Candy back through the morning of the killing, asking questions designed to avoid suggestion. In court, he testified that during the confrontation, Betty’s sharp “shush” echoed a sound from Candy’s early years, releasing a surge of fear that split her sense of control. The result, he said, was a brief dissociative break rather than deliberate intent to kill. His account gave jurors a psychological explanation that fit the defense’s claim of self-defense and helped them see Candy as panicked, not predatory.
The testimony proved powerful. It shifted the focus from motive to mind, from a brutal act to a woman overcome by shock. Critics outside the courtroom were far less convinced. Hypnosis, they warned, could distort memory and invent emotion. Psychologists debated whether such testimony belonged in court at all, calling it everything from innovative to irresponsible.
Fason stood by his methods, insisting that hypnosis, used carefully, could reach memories sealed off by trauma. His work in the Montgomery trial showed how psychology could alter the course of a case, even as it opened a lasting argument over how much of the mind belongs on the witness stand.
