The Heart Wrenching Story of Shanann Watts Murder by Her Husband

The murders of the pregnant mother of two Shanann Watts and her daughters, 4-year-old Bella and 3-year-old Celeste, sent shockwaves over the country in 2018. The crimes were tragic and senseless, and their horror was only compounded by the fact that Shanann’s husband and the girls’ father, Chris Watts, admitted to committing them.

Now, Netflix has pieced together all the murder events, firsthand footage for a new documentary that takes a closer look at the case. The nearly hour-and-a-half feature will be available to stream beginning on Wednesday, September 30.

Chris’s wife and daughters disappear.

Around 2 a.m. on August 13, 2018, Shanann Watts’s friend Nickola Atkinson dropped her off at her Frederick, Colorado home following a business tour they had taken together. But when Nickola tried to get in touch with Shanann just a few hours later, she couldn’t get ahold of her — and after Shanann missed an ob-gyn appointment, she grew worried. Nickola decided to call Shanann’s husband, Chris, at work. She also called the police.

The police investigated the Watts’ home that afternoon, and even though they found no signs of nasty play, they did find Shanann’s car and all of her personal belongings. So, the next day, Shanann and the girls were officially declared missing, and the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI) released Endangered Missing Person alerts for them.

The investigation

In the days that followed, Chris’s story changed drastically. He initially told police that he had no idea where Shanann, Bella, and Celeste might be. He began giving media appearances appealing to the community to help find his missing family.

Meanwhile, investigators from the local police department, the CBI, and the FBI had been going through Chris’s phone records, which showed that he had been having an affair with one of his coworkers from Anadarko Petroleum. Then, on August 15 (two days after his wife and daughters’ disappearances), Chris failed a polygraph test — and that’s when everything changed.

That afternoon, Chris vowed to state police the truth if he could talk to his father first. Investigators took a risk and let him do so, and it worked: Chris confessed to his father that he had killed his wife. Not long after, investigators found Shanann, Bella, and Celeste’s bodies exactly where Chris said they were: at an Anadarko Petroleum site, Shanann’s body in a shallow grave and the two girls’ bodies in oil tanks.

On August 21, 2018, Chris was charged with his family’s murders.

What happened in real?

In his initial confession, Chris said that he had choked Shanann in a “fit of rage” after watching her smother their two daughters, Bella and Celeste. She was upset, he said, because he had tried to talk to her about separating and ending their marriage, and she had retaliated by killing the girls. After murdering Shanann, he took the three bodies to the oil site and buried them, he said.

Come November; however, Chris’s story had changed again. This time, he confessed to killing his wife and daughters and pleaded guilty to all nine counts against him: five counts of first-degree murder (including two additional counts for his daughters because they were children under 12), one count of unlawful termination of a pregnancy, and three counts of tampering with a deceased human body. Ultimately, he was sentenced to five life sentences (three consecutive and two concurrent) for the murders, plus a total of 84 more years for the other crimes.

Although Chris had pleaded guilty to all three murders, he hadn’t yet told the real story of what happened on the morning of August 13, 2018. But in a five-hour follow-up interview with investigators from prison, Chris revealed the truth: After fighting with Shanann that morning about his wish to separate, Chris strangled her to death. While he was trying to bring his wife’s body downstairs, he said Bella and Celeste woke up and came to ask him what was going on. He then loaded the girls and their mother’s bodies into his truck, drove to the oil site, and smothered the girls one by one before disposing of the three bodies.

Chris and Shanann Watts’ Final Texts Before He Killed Her Are Revealed in Netflix Doc

On the day that Chris Watts killed his pregnant wife, Shanann, and their two young daughters, the couple texted about groceries and dinner plans.

“What kind of vegetables do you want with dinner tonight?” Shanann texted Watts.

“Broccoli works,” he responded. “Green beans work, too.“

In a new documentary from Netflix, newly-revealed letters and texts show that Shanann had no idea that her marriage would soon turn deadly. The documentary, entitled American Murder: The Family Next Door, begins streaming on September 30. An exclusive clip is shown above.

The documentary is featured on tonight’s episode of PEOPLE (the TV Show!).

″I miss and love you so much, ″ Shanann texted to Chris a few weeks before her death. ″I am still in shock that we are having a little boy! I am so excited and happy! ″

Shannan was 15 weeks pregnant at the time of her death.

To share the news of her pregnancy with Watts on May 29, Shanann donned a T-shirt with the words “Oops … we did it again,” and wore it in the video recording that she filmed as Watts came home that day. As Watts entered the home and approached her, the video shows him halting in mid-stride, breaking into a grin, and then walking up to Shanann and saying, “We did it again.“

Yet, according to court documents obtained by PEOPLE, Watts told his mistress, Nichol Kessinger, that he didn’t know Shanann was pregnant until she was reported missing. According to the documents, Watts told Kessinger the baby ″was, not him” — though authorities have discounted Watts’ claims of his wife’s infidelity.

On August 13, 2018, Chris strangled Shanann, 34, in their Colorado home. Then he killed his daughters — Bella, 4, and Celeste, 3 — at his job site on an oil field.

Chris starts talking to Nichol Kessinger

Nichol Kessinger works in Anadarko Petroleum’s environmental department and would see the operators, including Chris, on the way to the fridge. Chris came by her office and struck up a conversation one day. They have their first meeting outside of the office later in the month.

Chris Watts starts a physical relationship with Kessinger.

According to The Denver Post, Chris sees Kessinger about four or five times a week, and they begin a physical relationship in early July. He tells her that he’s almost divorced. Later that month, while Shanann and the girls are out of town in North Carolina, he tells Kessinger the divorce is final. 

Insider reports that Kessinger goes to Chris’ home for the first time on July 4, and they have their first phone call on record on July 7. They also go on a date to Shelby American Collection car museum on July 14 and spend the night at Great Sand Dunes National Park on July 28, all while his family is away. On July 30, he gives her a love note before joining his family on vacation.

Chris flies to North Carolina to join his family

Despite it being a family vacation, texts that Shan’ann forward to a friend show signs of trouble between the couple. Further messages also show that there was tension between her and Chris’ parents.

Kessinger shops for wedding dresses online.

Just weeks after they started talking, Kessinger’s cell phone data shows she looked at wedding dresses online for two hours.

Where Chris Watts is today

Watts was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Two years later, he is housed at Dodge Correctional Institution, a maximum-security prison, in Waupun, Wisconsin. (He was moved out of Colorado for security reasons.)

For 23 hours a day, Watts is on lockdown. He can leave his cell for a shower or exercise, but little else. When he is in his cell, he has little to do: He can have a Bible and family photos. He has pictures of his family next to his bed.

Last November, a source told PEOPLE that Watts had found religion in prison and that he reflects on his sins daily. “A day doesn’t go by — a minute doesn’t go by — where he doesn’t think about his family,” the source said. ″He’s in a hell of his own making.″

Watts proclaimed himself a “servant of God,” writing in a letter to his mother in June 2019, ″I’m still a Dad! I’m still a son! No matter what. Now, I can add servant of God to that mix!″

The texts revealed in American murder show that Shanann had no idea that her husband would soon kill her.

″Finally on a plane and about to take off,″ she wrote in her last text to Chris. ″Thank God! Prayers for a safe flight. Love you!” Chris did not respond.

The Netflix documentary American Murder: The Family Next Door begins streaming on September 30.

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