Netflix’s crime series and documentaries have captivated audiences and spurned conspiracy theories. In late September, they released American Murder: The Family Next Door. American Murder chronicles the story of Chris Watts of North Carolina who murdered his pregnant wife, Shan’ann, and his two daughters Bella, 4 and Celeste, 3, in August 2018.
Chris was having an affair with his younger co-worker. American Murder looked to fill in the blanks from when Chris and Shan’ann began to have issues in their marriage to the murder and subsequent interrogations by the police. However, American Murder left out a few details. Marie Claire gives more background details of what actually took place and possibly why. Here are a few excerpts:
Shan’ann got a promotion:
The couple filed for bankruptcy in 2015, court documents show, CNN reported shortly after Chris’ arrest. At the time, they had just purchased a $400,000 house and were about $70,000 in combined student loan and credit card debt. The documents show that Chris was the family’s primary breadwinner, taking in about $63,000 of their joint income of $91,000.However, in 2018, Shan’ann started a new job with a lifestyle company. She received a major salary boost, began driving a Lexus, and was sent on paid business trips to places like Mexico and the Dominican Republic, leaving Chris at home to take care of their daughters. It’s unclear how Shan’ann’s sudden financial success affected her marriage, but with her out of town more often, Chris began secretly dating a colleague, Nichol Kessinger.
Nichol Kessinger was more involved in the investigation:
While the documentary seems to theorize that Chris killed his family so he could be with Kessinger, it skims over the extent of her involvement in the criminal investigation. The geologist, who has said she didn’t know Chris was still married when they began dating in July 2018, called and questioned him when she learned about his family’s disappearance from the news. Once she learned the extent of his lies and felt that his responses to his questions “seemed off,” Kessinger immediately approached investigators to share everything she knew about Chris.Kessinger, who is now living a quiet life under the radar, quickly became convinced of his guilt, telling The Denver Post a few months later, “He’s a liar. He lied about everything… If he was able to lie to me and hide something that big, what else was he lying about?”
Chris confessed to knowing he was going to murder his family weeks before
For one thing, he wrote that he knew he was going to kill his wife and daughters well before doing so. After putting his children to bed the night before, he wrote, “I walked away and said, ‘That’s the last time I’m going to be tucking my babies.'” Of Shan’ann’s death, he wrote in another letter, “All the weeks of me thinking about killing her, and now I was faced with it.”Elsewhere in the letters, Chris revealed that, although he first attempted to smother his daughters in their beds before returning to his bedroom to kill Shan’ann, the two girls somehow “woke back up.” “It makes the act that much worse knowing I went to their rooms first and knowing I still took their lives at the location,” he continued, referring to the oil storage facility where he worked and where he hid the three bodies.
As a true crime buff, I wanted to watch the documentary despite already knowing that the husband did it from the first credits. When they showed a picture of him, I knew by his crazy eyes he was capable of murdering his wife and children. What irks me about these situations is, why kill your entire family in order to move on? Why can’t these psychos just file for divorce and remarry? It as if these bastards want to move on but feel their entire family don’t deserve to it. It is absolutely selfish and psychotic.
What really broke my heart is hearing how the eldest daughter knew her father was going to kill her and begged for her life. SHE WAS FOUR! How heartless do you have to be to murder your own children? I am quite livid by this story and how women and children are unprotected in society. The other thing that made me sad for Shan’ann is the time her husband rejected her. They were in the middle of having sex when he told her he didn’t love her anymore. Like how are you going to be inside a woman and tell her you feel nothing for her?
It would seem Chris was jealous that Shan’ann got a promotion and was leading the jetsetting life while he remained home with the kids. I have a feeling what attracted Chris to Shan’ann in the beginning was the fact that he thought she was broken as she had just had her heart broken by her first love. So when she got her come up, he got jealous and felt less of a man. What an idiot.
Even more infuriating was how Chris in the beginning tried to blame Shan’ann for the murders of his daughters. He lied and said she killed them, then he killed her. Of course we find out later that he murdered all three plus their unborn child. Through it all, the man didn’t share a single tear. I’ll leave with this, I hope he rots. Not just in jail but in hell if there is one and all the men like him.
Photos credit: Shanann Watts/Netflix/2020
I watched this documentary after hearing a podcast about it, I think it was Sword and Scale but i know Wine and Crime also covered this.
I think this is like, toxic masculinity on steroids. I agree with what was said above, that Shannon (my phone is going to autocorrect her name is it Shan’ann?) Got a promotion, started getting her life together, wasn’t a pet project for him anymore and his masculinity was in danger in his mind. The monstrosity it has to take to kill children, I cant even imagine.
Also, this is a small thing that picks at my nerves when Nichole (the affair?) Says that he has lied about everything and she can’t believe he lied to her and that he’s a liar, its like why.. cant you believe that. Hes clearly lying to his pregnant wife to be with you, he’s lying to his kids and family about why he needs a babysitter to take you out, your whole relationship is built on a lie, why are you surprised? That’s a small thing that bothers me in her quote but I also understand she is more likely in shock about the entire thing.
Yeah, Nicole knew he was married/with kids and had zero problems engaging in an affair with him. I didn’t care for the post-murder stance of “he lied to me about everything”, like she didn’t know.
In the discovery documents the state released, the state had evidence of Nicole googling Amber Frey, her net worth, and her book deal. The documentary went quite easy on Nicole, I thought, compared to some of the evidence compiled from her phone and computer records.
I may have heard wrong but I thought she said that he told her he has separated from his wife and they were in the process of a divorce. It’s a small detail that’s not important in this story in any case because the main story is so horrific. Chris is a monster that chose to murder his children instead of just separating from his wife.
Nicole knew he was married because she had looked at Shan’ann’s social media, which was public. Shan’ann posted all the time on social media, even her reveal that she was pregnant with their son.
She has always maintained that she didn’t INITIALLY know he was married. That’s plausible given he didn’t wear his wedding ring. She says he only disclosed it into their fling and only after casually mentioning his kids. I believe her on this. She seemed consumed with jealousy over both his wife and kids. It would make no sense for her to initiate this knowing the guy already had kids let alone a wife.
Whether she knew or not, everything that happened is all HIM.
Cruel, sadistic sociopath. He knew for weeks that he was going to kill his own children? The death penalty is too good for him. Give him life without parole and put him in Gen-pop. Nature will take it’s course.
+1
He did receive life in prison without possibility of parole. Shanann’s family asked for no death penalty because they didn’t want to see any more death. They’re stronger than I would have been in their shoes.
Sadistic is right. Those poor, beautiful baby girls…
It’s sad to see how forced his smile is with pictures with his family, and how genuine his smile is with Nichole. The video where Shanann tells him she’s pregnant with Niko is truly sad.
This is just so chilling, I feel sick. At least he was caught, which I know doesn’t always happen. I also don’t understand why divorce wasn’t an option. JFC.
I haven’t watched it yet and don’t know if I will, but my husband did a few nights ago and was really disturbed by the whole thing.
What’s compelling about it is, there’s no narrator or voiceover or sit down interviews. It’s all organic, footage from body cams and surveillance cameras and Shanann’s own home videos and texts. Chris’ police questioning and eventual confession is right from the police station hidden camera. That gives the whole program a sense of reality and then ultimate heartbreak.
The way he tells the investigators how he killed his baby girls matter-of-factly, “CeCe was first..” still gives me all of the chills. I only kept watching to see justice served to him. I was sick to my stomach. Even sicker now that I know he planned for weeks to kill them and those babies woke back up after he tried the first time.
His news interview when they were first reported missing reminds me so much of Scott Peterson’s interview like, why aren’t you more upset??
I didn’t like this one at all. I like a mystery that unfurls, but you could tell he was off from the very beginning.
In the first five minutes my partner said – he did it. He killed her and the kids and well he was right.
How he murdered his children still sits with me. How do you kill a begging 4 year old, twice. How do you drive with your children’s feet above their dead mother while they trust you for 45 minutes.
I think for me the moment of clarity was when he said he killed Shan because she had killed their children. No emotion. No concern for the unborn child. Nada. Because it was a story and he had no remorse.
This one. It sits with me.
Exactly. This wasn’t someone who snapped and killed his family in some moment of rage and passion (which would also be awful). To slowly and methodically kill two small children who trust and love you – that is pure evil.
We watched it last night and I found it super disturbing for this reason. It wasn’t a mystery. It was cold and disturbing. I kind of liked how it was presented, with no narrator, but that also meant there was no analysis or anything. It was clear from the beginning that the husband did it. I mean if my husband came home and I wasn’t there and the kids were missing, he would FREAK OUT. Not talk about my phone blowing up when it gets turned back on.
Obv, Divorce was an option. But he likely didn’t want to deal with the unpleasantness that comes with divorce. Just one more example of how horrifically selfish he was. He wouldn’t want to be in a position of paying alimony or child support, or heck, even co-parenting his kids. Also, as a classic narcissist, he didn’t want to be portrayed as the bad guy who left his wife and kids for a younger woman. (I mean,I realize how insane all this sounds- but had she not been found, i believe his “play” was going to be that she left him, right?)
The movie “To Die for” with Nicole Kidman is inspired by the Pamela Smart story and at this point, I can no longer remember what parts are taken from fact vs made up for the movie. But there is a scene where the kid that she is convincing to kill her husband asks “why not just divorce him ?” and she points out that her husband could get custody of their dog. i think that was actually taken from the true story. She wanted her husband dead, as there would be a pay out from insurance, and she would be the sole owner of all their material goods. And I think that is often a motive in these cases where a spouse murders the other.
A friend of mine is going through the starting stages of divorce. Neither party can afford their mortgage on their own, and where they live, buying as a single person is put of the question. Now, they are not psychpaths, so I guess they will sell the house and each go rent an apartment. But I think that in some cases, those types of financial issues provide motive for murder. Obv, Chris Watts was beyond evil, as he murdered his own kids too.
It was a good watch but it made me sick, seeing the videos of those precious little girls was heartbreaking. For a minute I thought the film was about to try and blame Shanaan for her own death because she could be controlling and bossy, but it steered away from that thankfully. Chris knew how she was before he married her, and he could’ve divorced her but he chose to murder her. I always tell my husband the biggest thing women have to be afraid of is men. It’s just horrifying that he went from devoted husband to killer so quickly just because he met someone else. He even says something about it at the end, he wouldn’t have thought they had a bad marriage if he never met Nicole.
On another note, I got a good giggle out of the whole “night shower” thing. I guess every couple has their own cues for sex, lol.
It was actually nice that for once a murder show is based on the victim and not on the murderer. I thought it was a “good watch” like you say because of that. It’s almost a portrait of a loving person engaged in a terrible relationship with a narcissist. That the show didn’t give him the satisfaction of focussing on him was very strategic and feminist. Loved it for that but I’d say it was a tough watch. Felt sick for days.
I thought so, too Slowdown. It was refreshing to watch a documentary about the lives that were taken and simply how inexplicable murder can be. Taking these lives was just so unnecessary and so unfair. I’m glad that the director made the decision to not go deep into his psyche.
As a single woman who dates men, this doc scared me.
@Jess – even him saying that about meeting Nicole seems like he’s shifting blame to her for his murdering his family.
The one thing that made this documentary so compelling was that Shananns problems were so normal. Falling out with you MIL over ice cream, worrying about you partner not wanting to have sex with you. Even the texts about her doing the food shop asking what veg he wanted. It really showed the normality of their life and how they were just like ever other couple. Shanann was worried that her husband was acting strangely. Her biggest fear was that he was cheating, people worry about that sort of thing all the time. never did she think he was planning her murder. That is what makes this case so terrifying.
I was a little bit awed by how much of this family’s life was documented. I started watching this knowing nothing and at one point thought it was a “mockumentary ” just because of all documentation.
So sad.
Yes, there was a lot of documentation, but Shanann was an oversharer, an abused person seeking validation, a mother proud of her children and honestly, kind of a basic b who worked for an MLM that encouraged her to promote/sell an enviable type of lifestyle. It was cringey to see her private text messages about craving sex with a man capable of betraying her in the worst way, and heartbreaking that Shanann and her daughters were fooled into thinking they had a good man in their lives. The film was a good lesson for the rest of us not to judge images and messages put out there on social media as the whole truth, because they never are. Even after watching the film and reading about the situation, we still don’t know everything about their experience. I hope the children had a lot of good days, despite everything.
Did you just refer to the victim as a basic b*tch? I hope you meant something else because that is a heartless thing to say about a woman murdered by her husband.
I remember when this case was in the news. It was so upsetting as more and more details gradually came to light, but what I hadn’t known before the documentary was the level of premeditation, how stone cold psychopathic he must have been to drive his daughters for an hour to the site and to hear that little girl beg and still not shed a single tear when talking about it. He’s a monster.
I think one of the worst aspects of this case was the baby being born after Sha’nann was killed. Just deeply horrifying.
He’s an inhuman monster.
What?? Omg. I didn’t know tnat! Did he kill the newborn or just leave it to die??
So essentially (and this is really so, so grim) – Shan’ann body expelled the foetus after death. The poor little thing hopefully was dead already, otherwise he would have suffocated as his mother was already buried by that point. The people locating the bodies reported that there was a baby’s body in the grave with Shan’ann.
Honestly it’s such an extremely awful conclusion to the atrocities Chris committed.
It’s called “coffin birth” and happens when a pregnant woman dies.
I can’t bear the idea of that 4 year old begging for her life from the Daddy she thought loved her. I sincerely hope that his days are full of horror and that nightmares fill his nights.
I already knew the story but watched the documentary anyway. What infuriated me (again!) was hearing his parents FORGIVE HIM for what he did during the trial. It seemed so out of place and honestly made me furious.
Agreed, there is something off about them as well.
His mother and sister wrote some article outright blaming Shannan for ruining her son’s life. So the apple didn’t fall far from the tree there.
Oh dear, I definitely look it up. Awful
His mother is a real piece of work. There’s a YouTube interview with her where she shows only concern for her son, none for her dead DIL and grandchildren. His parents didn’t attend the wedding because they didn’t like Shanann, but their son chose her, so they should have sucked it up. His mother and sister thought Chris was being “taken away” when he married—as if that isn’t normal for a married child. Just a really dysfunctional family.
His mother was a “strong” personality. Not a shock that he was attracted to and married a woman who also was a Type A strong personality.
Of course, not going to your child’s wedding b/c you “don’t like” the person he’s marrying- is disgusting.
It is so unbelievable, the murders- you know you could have divorced her, right?
Was it that he wanted to forget they existed?
Was his ego too fragile to handle the “failure” of a divorce?
Why wasn’t Shannan allowed to “move on”?
I’ve been reading here about how she was becoming more successful, and that hurt his ego.
It is baffling. He planned to do it. What did not kick in- in his brain- and said- okay crazypants- just move out today, stay with the gf for a bit. Marriage is over.
Ariel, I’m sure his motive was in large part financial. Imagine the amount of child support (and possibly alimony) he would have had to pay for three children–and considering their very young ages, he was probably seeing years and years of being strapped for money–and his salary was pretty inadequate to handle that, plus a new life. A narcissist like him could actually find it possible to believe that he was just “defending” himself and his life when he murdered his family in cold blood. Once he’d begun the affair with Nicole, he clearly saw Shan’ann as a sort of enemy, blocking him from what he saw as the happiness he felt he was entitled to.
I felt the same way, but realize he killed their grandchildren, too. The dad was able to get the confession from his son, which at least put the end to the hunt for the bodies. There’s also a big time gap. I can’t imagine knowing your kid did this horrible thing and I’m sure their lives were ruined in the process.
I hate when people who aren’t the victim offer forgiveness.
It’s not yours to give. Shannan and the girls are the only ones who can offer that and they are gone.
That made me crazy, watching his mother “forgive” him in court.
One of the things that really stood out to me in this documentary was the fact that Chris admitted that his mother and sister disliked Shan’ann and viewed her as “Stealing him away from them.” WTF! How abnormal and bizarre.
This bothered so much. Awful story.
This was horrifying on so many levels. The constant filming of the family contrasting with the messages to friends about a rocky marriage, the disengaged male telling his mistress she is so sexy while plotting the murder of the whole family, the true friend in tears worried about the family, the accusation of the wife having killed the cutest kids, the murderer calling those precious children “those kids” (as in sure, of course I am worried about “those kids”), the lie detector test, the horribly cold house without a single personal touch, his stupidity thinking he was going to get away with it when even his neighbor knew right away, his cold and empty parents still “forgiving him”, the illusion the poor poor woman had of being in a relationship, the building up the appearance of a family through shared home videos… so so heartbreaking.
The facebook version of life is seldom what it seems. in fact, i’ve noticed the more laying it on thick on facebook- the worse the reality is.
Not usually horrible murder reality- but the face you put on facebook, is the one you want people to think you are.
Completely disconnected from reality.
I saw a meme that described this so well. Now I can’t remember the exact words, but the gist was:
“Don’t compare your situation to what you see on social media. You are comparing your blooper clips to their highlight reels” or something like that, but much better said.
I followed this case when it happened, but this documentary really shook me up. My heart breaks for Shan’ann, who spent her last days believing that she was somehow the cause of their relationship falling apart… and those sweet babies. It chokes me up to even imagine one of them begging for her life and it makes me sick that he repeated it to the police and he was just so unmoved. Unbelievably heinous. This is one of those cases that really makes you realize that there is some true evil out there.
The extremely tidy house gave me the chills.
RE: HIS PARENTS FORGIVING HIM
This drove me INSANE. They missed their grand baby’s alright- but her? Weren’t they the ones who thought she wasn’t good enough?? It also broke my heart to see her parents tear up when they said this.
What mad me RAGE inside and equally broke me heart- when we hear the recordings of WOMEN saying “SHE DROVE HIM TO DO THIS etc”. The default of society to STILL question “Well what did she do???” … Even in regards to the mistress… UGH!
I think I will swerve this, Pregnant and hormonal, it’s not the one for me atm. So heart breaking.
Also pregnant and hormonal – I watched it but I cried and it really shook me.
Still healing from an abusive marriage that lasted 82 days and ended just before Xmas in 2019.
This sh!t kept me up for a week. So many panic attacks!
Please avoid it
Sorry you went through that. i hope that time is helping you heal and that your future is the brightest.
Apparently shannan was involved in MLMs so that explains money troubles and all of the social media stuff (it’s probably part of marketing). The doc mentions she was involved in direct sales. The business trips were probably sales conventions and the Lexus was probably leased (the company will make the payments if you meet certain sales quotas).
I was irritated when I saw that people had harassed her family and blamed her for her death!? What is wrong with people? She tried to save her marriage and she was obviously a loving mom with ambitions. Chris could have just filed for a divorce. I didn’t feel any which way about her not getting along with his family at first, but in the courtroom when chris’s family told him that they forgive him I shouted at the tv. The nerve.
Yeah, I was gonna say, I doubt she actually made money.
Fuck him.
Yeah exactly, I’m not sure why they left that out because it explains a lot. The money problems, the over sharing on social media, the car, the trips. I’m not passing judgement in the slightest, MLMs are predatory by nature. They drive people into debt.
I’m not surprised they declared bankruptcy. Seeing what their income really was, and the amount of their mortgage and spending, they had to be living on a lot of credit. She wrote a text to him that said she was “trying to make money.” I got the sense that the money wasn’t quite in their pockets just yet.
It’s fascinating how everything was documented. It felt like you were watching it in real time. The footage of Shan’ann and the kids was hard to watch knowing what would happen. Watching Chris though was a study in human deception. In the cop’s body cam footage he was cold, emotionless, trying to control the narrative. Notice how the neighbour smelled bullshit immediately and turned to tell the cop when Chris walked away.
I’m glad the neighbor immediately told the cop something was off and showed him the security camera footage. The most chilling part of that scene was that Chris only remembered that his missing wife was pregnant when the neighbor turned the footage off and a Nat Geo show about pregnancy was on the tv. That was such a weird and spooky moment.
At the end of watching this, I was so angry at this POS narcissist.
I watched this over the weekend – chilling. He should have just filed for divorce. I never understand how people think they can get away with things like this. I do find it odd his parents did not come to the wedding and the problems began shortly thereafter. And yes, chilling to hear his little girl say, “No daddy” – wow. He deserves what he gets.
It’s horrible tragedy, but one of the things I got out of it was how great her life looked on social media even though her marriage was crumbling. It just goes to show that Facebook life isn’t real.
@Audrey, truth – your statement about FB life. I have read countless articles written by psychologists stating that many don’t understand that fact – FB posters post what is GREAT there and it’s not real life. And that causes people to examine their life and if there are issues it leads many to depression – all because we see what people want to show us. I belong to a mom’s group on FB and women in our area come with real issues and real problems. Brings reality of life back into focus.
@Oya, thank you for covering these docuseries.
Yeah, in my experience on Facebook the Perfect Family narrators are on an express train to divorce. And the Perfect House/Car/Boat posts always indicate impending financial ruin. Always. (In my non-scientific sociological study.) And then, when the divorce/bankruptcy starts to happen … their feed contains nothing but inspirational quotes. Seriously, they should do anthropological studies on this.
Lol about the inspirational quotes. So true. I cannot believe the dramas I have watched unfold via FB posts. It’s just so dumb, which is how a friend recently characterized FB.
@phaedra
I agree completely.
Every time you see someone who lifecasts/overshares like that on social media, you can assume they are
1) lying about things to look better; and
2) really unhappy.
People who feel good about themselves don’t need that much attention.
Second that!! Of people I know who use their FB or insta to post gushing statements about their spouses…all of them, ALL, are having serious marital issues.
You said it all.
They left out a lot for sure. I wish they’d explained the stupid Thrive patches she sold that everyone was wearing the whole time. My daughter thought she was wearing an insulin pump and didn’t notice all the other people wearing them lol. Then she was like, Oh, THAT”S why she was posting every single thing on facebook. MLM people are all the same.
There was also a lot more in his interrogation, but they did a great job getting the confession out of him.
I saw her wearing a patch and assumed it was a nicotine patch. I don’t even want to know what a Thrive patch is.
Thrive is a horrible predatory MLM that sells patches that supposedly give people more energy and nutrients through the skin. You might as well slap on a Band-Aid or a piece of duct tape instead – it is cheaper and just as effective.
She almost certainly was losing money but trying to present an image of success. A lot of MLMs encourage their members to “fake it until you make it.”
Woo that female investigator was sharp!
She really is! She planted the excuse that Shannan killed the girls to Chris as bait, they took a break, then he comes back and says just that. Like, Chris, homie. No one believed you from the start.
She blew my mind! I kept thinking, “This is a small town, surely she hasn’t interrogated that many murder suspects,” but she was amazing.
Some of y’all have called him a narcissist, but he is more than that. He is a psychopath- he feels no empathy for others, which is why he wasn’t affected by killing his own children. She really had no chance. A great book about these type of people is called the Sociopath Next Door by Dr. Martha Stout.
Bingo and thank you.
I might read that, it sounds interesting and useful, I have college level knowledge of this subject but it wasn’t a major so didn’t delve into it much.
Just dropping in to say Sociopathy and Psychopathy are two completely different disorders, he was more likely a psychopath. Psychopaths feel no emotion or remorse towards their actions or others, sociopaths feel limited empathy for others around them. Psychopaths can follow societal norms quite easily as well which is what it seems Chris did. I don’t really think he felt anything for his mistress, either. I think he was swept up in the excitement of desire, being desired and having an affair. He was very quick to call her a devil woman and blame her for his actions.
Mental Health Worker, here. Not passing out an armchair diagnostic (I hate that) but just pointing out the small differences 🙂
She worked for an MLM so I would take any boasts she made about her job with a grain of salt. Those things encourage glossing over how little you make, etc. Also they make you pay for those trips yourself.
I’d imagine her working in a pyramid scheme was just contributing to their debt.
You will be pleased to know that he has been inundated with fanmail from women since his conviction. He is apparently one of the most “eligible prisoners” in the country.
And yes, I too wonder what is wrong with all these women
Yes Julie! I saw an article on his “fan mail”. What on earth possesses a woman to reach out to THAT? I mean, for starters, he is in jail for life. Also, cheated on his wife who was pregnant AND the mother of his 2 kids. Neither of these make him a big prize. But of course, the whopper being that he then murdered his entire family in cold blood. What about all of that says “sign me up?” Also, it pisses me off as he probably enjoys the attention and I don’t want that monster to have even one bit of light for the rest of his miserable life.
See, I don’t think this dude has crazy eyes at all and that’s what makes him even more terrifying. He looks like any other husband you would see in a white, suburban neighborhood. What a monster. His poor wife and babies. I will never understand how someone could be capable of such cruelty and violence.
I thought I had read that he did it because he didn’t want to look like an asshole for leaving his family. If he framed his wife for the murders he would be seen as the true victim. I haven’t watched the doc yet.
The big thing I picked up on 2 years ago was that he was always trying to get people to like him. Like when the police ask him if he told his little girl he was going to kill her like he killed her sister, he said “no! I wouldn’t do something like that!”
Psycho! You killed her whether you told her you were going to or not. You’re already an evil, feckless man. Sick
That’s the thing. People who say he had crazy eyes knew what he’d done. I went into the documentary blind (I live in Europe and had no idea about this) and didn’t clock for a while that he’d totally done it.
And that is TERRIFYING. He looks like any other dude you might meet in the street.
Oh yeah I guess in Europe this story barely made the news, if at all. I remember when the Casey Anthony trial was happening when I lived in Spain. HUGE story in the USA, but it was not covered by the Spanish media at ALL.
But this was a huge story here when it happened and I think everyone knew it was Chris. So it’s impossible for any American viewer to watch this documentary without thinking Chris has Crazy Eyes because we all know he did it off the bat. I’m really into true crime and 9 times out of 10 the husband did it, as cliché as it is. Most murder victims are killed by someone they know, not a complete stranger. Even in the days before he was arrested, pleading to the media for Shannon to “return,” it all seemed like a performance.
Im in South Africa
Also went into it blind thinking its a horror movie
I couldn’t sleep for a few days
And my lawyer brain decided to research all thr back stories to this
Made it even worse…
I wish he could live for 200 years
So that he can relive this nightmare for that long
Same. I don’t get that from him at all. I knew the case when watching the documentary and I was waiting for the moment where you see his psychopath reveal itself. Didn’t come.
crazy eyes = dead lifeless eyes. When the story hit the news in 2018, before they knew he had did it, I knew he had did it. And I knew another woman or relationship was the reason behind it.
It didn’t take long for suspicion to set in for me, but the point is, he is unemotional and lots of people in shock get like that. Then, when he is being questioned whether he wanted his family to come back, I think, there is a moment, a flicker of a smile when he is asked that, when I thought ok… he is weird. It’s that smile of the cat that got the rat and thinks no one knows.
Which leads me to think that he was very unintelligent, how could he think that the police wouldn’t find out?
Also had a suspicion about a woman popping up at some point.
I can watch horror movies all day but I can’t do true crime. Too heartbreaking and makes me too distrustful of everyday people, tbh. Nothing about this guy screams murderer on the outside. He looked like a normal dad.
Monsters like this can’t divorce, move away and carry on. They simply can’t sever ties and take a different road because, for them, it’s unfinished business. They can’t leave something on the plate and push it away. The only way is erasing them. Then they don’t have to think about them anymore. It’s sick, yes. But I get it. By taking parts of your past off the board, the slate is clean and ready for new players.
These people shouldn’t get death. They should serve a despicable existence for as long as they can. Not mail date. Not studying or reading or learning a new hobby. These people should serve. Put him on a stationary bike to provide electricity for himself and other inmates. While showing family videos all day every day.
I am fascinated by this mindset, that divorce is not an option, but murder/getting rid of- is.
It breaks my brain.
It’s so unfathomable. And after reading this thread, I watched it. I can’t get over how people could excuse his murder because his wife was high maintenance. Or she was naggy. Or she was anything at all. For all of us here, is there some behavior that would justify murder? Pedophilia might drive me to an edge. And sexual abuse involving my child might push me over, but in the end, it’d be more important for the pedophile to suffer a very long time.
I am still haunted after watching this. What angers me so much is how many people have blamed Shan’ann for her murder, and that of her children. The women in the documentary that talked about how it was HER fault? It is absolutely sick. And thinking about Bella…knowing what was happening. All of them being murdered by this man they trusted and thought would protect them. How can anyone look at this case and defend him?
Thanks for covering this and providing the additional insight. It stayed with me for days after watching. She worked for Thrive, a MLM, so I’m not sure I’m ready to believe she was actually banking. I kept thinking, “Why doesn’t you just tell her you’re out? Don’t annihilate your family!” Knowing that his daughter knew she was going to be killed was horrifying. And how he dumped them…
After I watched the documentary, I watched the Unmasking NK series on YouTube. Nicole Kessinger knew much more than she admits to. Shannans life was basically broadcast on her public Facebook account. All the videos, including pregagncy announcement.
NK was aware of shannan and her marriage and pregnancy. The police information shows that NK googled shannan in August of 2017.
Unmasked included all her police interviews as well. The woman acted strange by any standard. She deleted her texts from Chris before the police asked to see them. phone logs show that she and chris had a 111 minute phone call early in the morning, same morning he killed shannan.
If you have time, watch the series, it raises very good questions based on the information the creators got from public information requests. NK knew much more than she admitted.
She seemed suspicious to me too. The other woman always seem to have an imprint on these situations. I’ll check out the doc. Thanks for the rec.
I live in Denver and watched this case unfold. After watching the series I could not sleep for two nights. The way he described monotone having to kill his daughters because one walked in and dropped them in the tanks alive, it was honestly more chilling than a Bundy interview to me. Re his parents, his Dad is the only way they got a confession and you could see the horror wash over him as he realized what his son had done. That was merciful of his Dad to get to a resolution. I don’t blame the Mom for searching for a way to make sense of it all. These acts are unfathomable and it’s possible she is trying to get by day to day. What’s odd is he doesn’t fit the profile of a psychopath or sociopath. I read some articles of profs that believe he was a master at mimicking human emotion for decades and that he just viewed this as the next logical step in his “annihilation” of his family. But people who do a mass family killing usually kill themselves. This is a unique form of evil.
True but there several cases of these men who kill their wives and children in order to move on with a new person. Scott Petersen, there was a guy in Houston (Katy) who killed his pregnant wife after getting a new girlfriend. It is crazy how often this ish happens and makes me NOT want to date. But I always trust my instinct and if a guy gives me the ick… I’m out.
‘Why can’t these psychos just file for divorce and remarry? It as if these bastards want to move on but feel their entire family don’t deserve to it.’
I never thought of it like that
So horrifying! Hearing about those little girls being killed turned my stomach. Shann’an was actually involved in a pyramid scheme for her job and I’ve read that even though she projected a luxury life they were actually in more debt since these companies are so predatory. To stay on top of the pyramid she had to buy product and reinvest into her down line and were in more debt because of it. These companies are scum and promise women a way to make money while being at home but in reality over 99% of people lose money. I hate MLMs because of this. The perfect house and perfect Facebook life hid a horrible marriage and murders.
I was working in Firestone, CO this summer and happened to be in their neighborhood. It’s a $400,000 house. And yet he only made $63,000. It’s a very nice subdivision and a very nice house and I think that was one of the motives for killing her and the children was he wanted no financial responsibility for child support.
The house is still in the market and allegedly he still owns it even though it’s been foreclosed on.
Her parents devastation was just heartbreaking. Also the texts she sent her friend about the unraveling relationship and his callous behavior towards her was awful. Did he kill his daughters before putting them in the tanks or were they still alive?
The autopsy report said oil in stomach and lungs
Ugghhhh. How horrible.
He suffocated them before. I think (I may be wrong) he killed the youngest one first, then dropped her into the oiled tank whilst the older daughter was watching. When he killed bella last and she was the only one who tried to fight him off. She was yelling “daddy no”. He even said that “she didn’t understand death, but knew she was about to die”. I can’t imagine what it must have been like to realise in your last few moments that your dad, who you love, is going to murder you.
she begged him not to do the same to her as he did to his sister. ugh
I watched this a few days ago, and I thought it was a fitting addendum to the Netflix doc as far as Nicole goes:
https://youtu.be/Jddcj_ErpeQ
Additionally there were at least a couple of half-hour to hour-long Youtube docs released long before the Netflix one that were as good as if not superior if you’re still craving more.
Like…my read on Chris is different. He was a chunky dork when he and Shanann got together. She was always the more dominant personality in their relationship. I don’t think it was so much that he was threatened by her “success” when she was always a go-getter.
But something (before Nicole) happened to make the chunky dork start working out, get fit and tan, and let his eyes wander. And where it seemed like he was originally into being the submissive in their relationship, he started to resent Shanann for emasculating him. I dunno…
Shannan didn’t emasculate him.
It’s his own toxic ideas of what he ‘deserved’
I didn’t mean that she herself actually emasculated him. I meant more that he felt emasculated by being in a relationship with a woman who ran the home and family and controlled most details of their day-to-day lives.
… and started cheating with a woman who seemed very controlling, Nichol in the interviews strikes me as such.
Both Shanann and him apparently had OCD issues, and I think that he was not right in the head, but to do that for “firsts” , stupid idiot.
I LOVE the friend and the neighbor.
What BS. No one made him cheat and then murder his wife and kids. Also I find it gross some posters are acting like Nicole had anything to do with this. She cheated on a guy who told her he was separated from his wife. Shocker, guys who cheat lie.
This was so creepy to watch. The whole body cam angle was hard to watch.
He apparently lived a life where he let his wife lead and manage things. Then he gets angry and tries to “renew” his life with a woman who seemingly also took the lead on things.
He did not deserve his family, how terrible that they had to suffer and die for what? for nothing.
they did not see i coming, they did not even had the chance to fight for their life.
Okay so I went on deep dive into this story after watching the doc, and here are some things I found out about Nicole K’s (the mistress) involvement in the case:
-She said she met Chris in July 2018, but she had googled searched Shannan in 2017 and again in January 2018. Some theorize the 2017 date in the discovery documents was a typo, but that doesn’t explain the January search.
-In the emails with Chris in July 02 start off professional, but soon turn flirty (from his end) and she initially tells him she doesn’t want to let it get any further because he has a WIFE and kids—this was before their Sand Dunes trip when Shannon was away at her parent’s.
-The police also discovered a few more searches she did of Shannan well after the affair had started, as well as googling stuff about husbands leaving their wives for mistresses
-Chris at one point deleted his Facebook. He told Shannan it was to take a break from social media, but he at one point told police it was because Nicole asked him to because her friends kept telling her how they clearly are not a couple who are going through a separation since they kept seeing Shannan’s posts praising her husband and their happy life together.
-She has been inside Shannan’s and Chris’ home at least once before while Shannan was away (July 14). It’s pretty obvious they still lived together as a family. But again, just a quick google search of Shannan would lead you to her FB page which would have confirmed that as well .
-Before going to the police she searched to see if the police can recover deleted texts, she also told her friends to delete anything she had told them about Chris.
-Nicole’s cell-phone pinged in Chris’ and Shannan’s town (Frederick) at 6:16am the morning he left to depose of the bodies (Nicole lived in Thornton) The only other times her phone ever pinged in Frederick was when she was there meeting Chris. Many people think she helped him load the bodies that morning, and there is a YouTube video that claims they actually see her at one point in the video (very hard to make-out) but honestly i was willing to believe it because the size and walk and length of the hoodie in the footage doesn’t really match what Chris was wearing in that same video. But that’s just me willing to believe it.
—A few hours after he had disposed of the bodies and “found” Shannan’s ring, Chris texted Nicole and asked what she thought he should do with it, and she very callously said, “pawn it.”—Does that sound like a woman who was completely hoodwinked by Chris? I don’t think so.
—So all these facts are known to the police, so it begs the question why they didn’t investigate her further nor arrest or charge her with anything—i mean she straight up lied about not knowing he was married, and not separated. Well, apparently it was included in Chris’ plea deal that no one else should be investigated further (i forgot the actual wording for it). So the police were just happy to get a confession and leave it at that.
I haven’t seen the doc, but just trying to remember from the news at the time, she thought he was divorced or in the process of divorcing? I think that’s what was meant by not knowing he was still married? I can see someone googling someone’s ex.
@Emu
I get that too. But it doesn’t explain her googling Shannan at least 7 months before she supposedly met Chris. Or why, if she was so innocent to know the truth about their divorce/separation, then why did she go to the lengths of trying to erase her chat history with Chris, and the mentions of him to her friends? At the time she went to the police they had not arrested Chris yet, so she wasn’t being looked into, so really she had no reason to google how to hide texts from the police. Does that sound like something an innocent person would do?
If she really did believe him that they were gonna get divorced then why make him to take down his FB? —the only reason it bothered her is because everyone could see from their FB that they didn’t look like a separated family at all and her friends kept telling her that.
Nichol and Chris probably did talk about him divorcing Shannan, but she went to police pretending Chris was a huge liar and that she had no idea they were both very much together. She knew. Chris didn’t fool her about anything. She partook in the affair with her eyes wide open.
Why should she be investigated? He killed his wife and kids. None of what you posted matters much except that she probably lied to herself about how separated he really was.
@Whateveryousay
Because, as I mentioned, people believe she was there that morning helping him. That she knows way more than she said to police.
Chris mentioned that one of the reasons he thought about killing Shannan was because Nichol mentioned she wanted to be the one to give him his first son. Yet she pretended to the police she didn’t know Shannan was pregnant when she went to them.
I personally believe she knew way more about Chris planning to kill Shannan than she let on, and was somehow involved in it.
Btw, nothing from what I said was meant to take any culpability away from Chris. He’s 100% guilty. I just believe Nichol was somehow involved. She definitely wasn’t this clueless victim she pretended to be.
THIS!
I went down the Reddit rabbit hole after watching this and am incredibly surprised the police didn’t investigate NK any further.
Even if she wasn’t an accomplice, she knew WAY more than she let on.
This case is just so incredibly disturbing, I cannot fathom how he could have killed his sweet innocent children with such premeditation and callousness. Driving them for over 45 mins towards their death and not even pausing to reconsider what he was doing, even when his daughter was begging for her life.
That video of Bella singing “my daddy is my hero” after knowing what he did to them absolutely wrecked me.
Prison is too good for this monster
I’ve not stopped thinking about this since I watched the Netflix doc. What strikes me most about his case is that he doesn’t seem to fit into any killer stereotype. Anyone who studies murder will tell you that serial killers all carry the same traits.
There are serial killers like ted Bundy who murder for sexual gratification. Killing to them is a desire that can’t be controlled. It’s like trying to change your sexual orientation. I don’t get that vibe from the husband. I don’t think he did it cos it turned him on.
Then there are the ones who accidentally kill a loved one in a fit of rage. Usually they would show remorse over what they have done once it has hit them. Again that’s not him either.
Then there are those who kill their family in a murder suicide, so they can all die together. Or they kill their kids as an act of revenge in their partner for something they did. Again that’s not the case here, because this bastard wanted to live his live after the act.
I think think this guy coasted through life with the killer instinct laying dormant in him. I don’t think he resented his family, I think like most people he just thought getting married and having kids was the right thing to do in life. I think he played along with his life without realising he didn’t feel anything, like most people who live life like ground hog day. I don’t think he felt anything for his family and he didn’t realise that, until he met his mistress. I think this surge of feeling and emotions that he felt for his side piece woke the beast in him. She sprung him to life and only then did he realise how little his family meant.
His lack of emotion and remorse is truly terrifying. I feel so sorry for Shanann and her daughters, they were a lovely family who deserved so much better. He literally could have just walked out the door and never looked back, and they could have lived their lives. You just don’t kill your entire family because you have met someone new. That’s what makes this case so interesting.
He’s a family annihilator which has a very specific profile. Here’s a good article on him fitting the category.
https://medium.com/the-true-crime-edition/family-annihilators-psychological-profile-823d28b1a5cd
Thanks for the link I just read it. I think what makes this case so interesting and sets it apart it that this a**hole wanted to live after the fact.
If he wanted to do this as an act of revenge towards Shanann for whatever reason, she would have live long enough to see him do it.
Something is definitely up with the mistress. I don’t know whether she coaxed him into it because she thought they would cash in. Didn’t he look up places to live, right after he did the murders?
I”m in Colorado and remember when it happened. Yikes!
I think finances was a big part of it, big in debt and her ‘lifestyle’ job was a multi-level scheme, no? That and he was also a psycho.
She didn’t get a promotion and the business trips weren’t paid for. She worked for an MLM, a pyramid scheme. Of course she doesn’t deserve anything that happened to her but it’s unclear why people consistently misrepresent her work to put a positive, false, spin on it. She leveled up by signing up people below her and earned more money as a result. It wasn’t an ethical business, it was a pyramid scheme. I doubt she fully understood that.
I think they lived well beyond their means, in all aspects, choice of school, choice of home, clothes, etc. A divorce would not solve his Debts and child support problems if hw divorced, unless he escaped out of the country.
It still doesn’t explain how he thought he would get away with it. Self centered idiot.
She had good friends, she should’ve taken her children at some point and run away.
Sadly, she was too used to show a perfect life for her work, that she maybe overlooked alarm signs and hopelessly wished for mending things.
I read this somewhere, cannot recall where, that one of his female admirers said he should ask for an appeal based on the Thrive patch ingredients which could have contributed to his altered mental status.
This man probably never solved a problem in his life.
Chris Watts had always been an empty shell, I think he’s both a sociopath and a covert narcissist. I learned (as a single woman) a few red flags from this case. He did the classic ”love bombing” with Shannan when they first met years ago. She was ill (with lupus) and vulnerable, having recently left another abusive marriage. He pursued…. and pursued…. and pursued…. She was vulnerable and wasn’t that into him at first, but he wore her down. Covert narcissists love-bomb in that way, they find someone vulnerable and become their ”savior”. He was starting to do the same thing with Nicole Kessinger (she’s bipolar and had her own vulnerabilities with men). That’s how he slinks his way into people’s lives. He then plays the ”nice, helpful, quiet, doting, Daddy-daycare” role expertly. He never truly loves anyone, he’s a sociopath, but his wife and children are objects that he uses to boost his image and to get his narcissistic supply. Not all Narcissists are sociopaths of course, but he’s a classic Covert Narcissist (different from their more grandiose Overt Narcissist cousins). As Shannon got healthier, her lupus improved, her career took off, she didn’t need him in the same way. Truthfully, he probably would have done this anyway once he met a new source of supply (Nicole). It was inevitably on the cards, nothing really ”went wrong”, he was just never ”right” to start with. Shannan didn’t like him at first, I wish she’d trusted her instinct about him. His mother is an awful Narcissist too. Such an incredibly sad story.
Thank you. A friend who is a psychologist who watched this said the same things. He fits the family annihilator path to a tee too.
During the interviews he kept calling the little girls “those children” , “these children”, instead of MY DAUGHTERS, MY BELOVED DAUGHTERS, or saying their names.
The other woman, well, she was made to repeat the names of the three of them, she didn’t want to acknowledge them, She was calling his unsuspecting wife “his significant other”.
In no way am I blaming Shanann. But when a horrific tragedy like this occurs, it makes sense to try to understand the set and setting. As in other family annihilations, they were in quite serious financial trouble. They were in the process of filing their second bankruptcy. As in the first bankruptcy, they had massive credit card debt. They were being sued by their HOA for a year’s worth of payments that had not been made. Shanann was good at selling the products, but her commission was not large. The children were both in a full-time private school at a cost of $25,000 per year, so that Shanann could have the freedom to pursue sales, meetings, made FB posts about the products, etc, and Chris could work. If she did not meet a certain level of sales each month, she had to make the lease payment on the Lexus.They were both wearing caffeine patches and Shanann described in her Fb posts how they were sleeping fewer hours than usual and working many hours on their home as well, almost frenetically. I think that the MLM has a lot to answer for in what happened to this family, though only Chris is responsible. It’s all so sad.
Yeah, one look at their house, along with the knowledge that she’s in an MLM and you know they were living beyond their means.
Exactly, Billie, that huge house and its mortgage consumed most of his salary. Yes, Shanann was working for an MLM. According to the Federal Trade Commission, 99% of people who join a multi-level marketing company lose money, with the “vast majority of commissions paid by MLM companies going to a tiny percentage of TOPPs (top-of-the-pyramid promoters)…”
I get what you’re saying, but I find the interrogating police officer’s theory more plausible: guy gets fit, guy discovers that young attractive woman is interested in him, guy wants to get rid of old life in order to pursue new fun life that he never had before.
A lot of ‘family annihilators” who do it because of financial problems and the shame of bankruptcy usually kill themselves so they can all be together. What makes this case so interesting is that the husband wanted to live. He wanted a new live with his new woman which only shows how disturbing he is.
I don’t think I can stomach watching this.
I too believed he was responsible for their disappearance/deaths immediately after they went missing..
I sometimes think I have a controversial take on these things, because I don’t think sociopathy or psychopathy exist in the way people like to think they do. I feel like that is too easy an explanation for the sorts of evil that exist in this world. I think everyone’s first impulse is to distance themselves immediately from people who commit horrific acts like these, but they’re human like everyone else. Understanding why they do what they do means the rest of us can better understand why we choose to not behave in those ways.
And it is absolutely a choice. This man made these choices. I feel like psychopathy, in the definition we see today, makes it seem like these people have no choice BUT to behave that way. I don’t believe that. I don’t believe in inherent evil. I don’t because I see people around me make a choice to do the right thing every day, and it is consciously a choice. And most of all, I don’t believe it because I think it gives men like this an easy excuse to absolve themselves of all their crimes, to blame weird brain chemistry, when the fact is, he knew he was doing something reprehensible, but he chose to do it anyway. And that is a choice he made, that the rest of us would never do.
Very very *very* few of us are actually helpless in the face of our better judgement, and too many people like to latch on to stuff they think excuses their behaviour and gives them an incentive to never become a better person.
I think both things are true: sociopaths and psychopaths are absolutely real, and more common than people may realise (about 4% of us). Psychopaths are more ”hard wired” than sociopaths, and they demonstrate psychopathy at a very young age. I agree that both do absolutely have a choice in their behavior (particularly sociopaths like Chris Watts). You can be a ”successful sociopath”. Not all sociopaths or psychopaths are violent or family anniliators. So they’re just like the rest of us in that way, they do make choices. However the result of their poor/selfish choices is absolutely shocking due to their callousness and depravity. It’s like living with a loaded gun, they always have the potential for it but they do absolutely have choice, I agree on that front. Chris seems like a weak/covert narcissist/sociopath. He’s really a coward underneath, he probably killed Shannan while she was sleeping. For someone like him, it’s not inevitable, but highly likely that he’s capable of such a thing. If he’d been able to find power/supply in other areas of his life, and was less pathetic, he may have been a ”successful sociopath”. He’s not the brightest guy either.
She was fighting for their relationship while he pretended that nothing was wrong. If he wanted out, the coward could have just said so. Ugh. Don’t get me even started on the psychopaths online that bullied this poor woman’s family and then tried to shift blame to her. These monsters live amongst us.
I think he seemed pretty checked out in the videos that were shown of him and the family long before he started up with the mistress. That one where she tells him she’s pregnant was just plain weird. HIs reaction was almost non-existent.