The boxing skills were meant to save him. Prosecutors allege he used them to kill.

When Montray McCray approached Harold Williams about training him to become a professional boxer, the owner of Pigtown’s Hot Box Baltimore gym agreed without hesitation.

Not many people are willing to dedicate themselves to the sport, so Williams almost always takes those clients on pro bono, he said. He agreed to do the same for the 32-year-old McCray, despite his past legal troubles.

“Any boxing coach who has a decent boxer will tell you that the majority of great boxers have something off about them,” Williams said. “They’re going to be a little rough around the edges.”

Williams coached McCray, whom he said showed real talent, to a win in his first “professional style” fight. McCray said in an Instagram post that winning the fight was a “lifelong dream” come true.

It was a short-lived triumph.

After working with McCray this past summer, Williams says, his trainee stopped showing up without explanation around the beginning of September. Weeks later, police and prosecutors allege, McCray used his boxing skills to attack a beloved and well-known Fells Point couple shortly after they had breakfast at Broadway Market.

On the morning of Sept. 29, authorities said, McCray argued with security officers at a homeless outreach program. He then spotted local artist Claudia Bismark, 76, and her husband, Wade Wilson, 60, paying for their breakfast with cash at Vikki’s Fells Point Deli in Broadway Market.

Authorities say he followed the couple after they left the market holding hands, then punched Wilson in the face, knocking him into his wife and causing both to fall to the ground. He appeared to search Wilson’s pockets for his wallet, and when he saw Bismark attempt to get up to help her husband, “he pulled his body and arm backward and forcefully punched Mrs. Bismark in the face, causing her to fall and strike her head on the ground,” the Baltimore state’s attorney’s office said in a news release. He allegedly took Wilson’s wallet, which contained $150, and fled.

Both were hospitalized. Bismark died of her injuries two days later. Upwards of 100 people turned out for a vigil on Oct. 1 at the scene of the attack to remember their friend and neighbor.

McCray was arrested shortly afterward and now faces first-degree murder and robbery charges, online court records show.

The incident reflects how quickly McCray’s life unraveled, from a promising start in college to a series of personal and professional troubles that now have him facing life in prison, according to interviews and court records.

State’s Attorney Ivan Bates and Mayor Brandon Scott announced on Oct. 29 that McCray had been indicted in the case of Bismark’s death. They said they feel very good about the chances of a conviction and will pursue a sentence of life without the possibility of parole.

“A trained boxer’s hands are a weapon, those are the type of arguments you would allow the jury to hear,” Bates said of how McCray’s training played a role in the attack.

McCray was also indicted on assault and robbery charges for allegedly punching a man and robbing him of $80 outside of an Inner Harbor Chipotle three days before the Fells Point couple. His public defender did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

McCray attended Baltimore County Public Schools, playing football at Lansdowne High School, according to former classmates. He eventually graduated from Woodlawn High School in 2011, a school spokesperson said. It’s unclear how or why he started running into trouble.

McCray has several past convictions, including for theft, violating a protective order and drug charges.

Court records show McCray’s stepmother petitioned the courts in 2021 for a protective order against him for herself and his father and stepbrother, accusing him of harassment and sending threatening text messages. A judge denied the petition. McCray’s family declined to comment about his recent arrest.

A woman who said she had a sexual relationship with McCray filed multiple temporary protective orders against him in early 2022 accusing him of stalking her, following her to various places, physically and mentally abusing her, threatening to harm her and putting her “in fear of imminent serious bodily harm,” according to court documents.

The woman told the courts she and McCray had a four-month relationship and lived together, but that she asked for an order requiring him to leave her home and stay away from her, her residence and job. The woman declined to comment.

When Williams saw a video of the Sept. 29 attack on the couple on social media, he called his former client to confront him. McCray told him what Williams described as a “blatant lie,” that he wasn’t involved.

“That’s not what I’m coaching for, it’s just a total misrepresentation of boxing,” Williams told The Banner.

Williams felt betrayed and disappointed. He said McCray knew he had a space where he could stay at his gym if he fell on hard times.

He wasn’t the only one who said they took a chance on McCray and was left disappointed.

Eric Ross, 33, said he met McCray when they were both students at Bowie State University around 2012. Ross would greet McCray when they ran into each other on the promenade.

Ross hadn’t seen McCray since then, until he ran into him by chance at a laundromat in Little Italy in May.

After updating each other on life — Ross finding God after battling health issues and McCray being unemployed for about two years — Ross invited McCray to his place of worship, Union Church.

McCray came that night and joined the church, Ross said.

Ross also gave him a job driving his cargo vans for deliveries through his business, Ross Solutions LLC, a financial advisory and logistics company.

“That’s all I could do: give him a job. Give him an opportunity to put some money in his pocket so that the event that happened down on Fells Point would’ve never had to happen,” Ross said.

Issues with McCray and clients arose within weeks, Ross said, from him arguing with a security guard at one place to another client telling Ross that McCray was not welcome back at their facility.

“I’m starting to see a side of Montray I never seen before,” Ross said. “I just started seeing a shift in Montray, like, he had this ‘I don’t give a damn’ mindset within that second month of him working with me.”

A woman threw a brick through one of the vans McCray drove, Ross said, and questions arose about his use of the company van. In the two months they worked together, McCray also accrued 13 traffic tickets — most of which Ross said he had to pay.

Ross said McCray stopped working with him on Aug. 4. When Ross saw on social media that McCray had been arrested for a woman’s death, he wasn’t surprised.

Said Ross, “He’ll talk so gangster, but ain’t nothing gangster about putting your hands on [an] old lady,”