There’s More To Chris Watts’ Murder Of His Family That Netflix Does Not Show

Many pieces of information were left out

Never has a story gripped more people — including me. Two weeks ago, I wrote a story wondering why we are all so fascinated with murder. In this case, family annihilation — and even more specifically, this family’s story that seemingly made no sense.

After publishing that story, I learned that the Netflix documentary left out key facts, which forced me to take another look. The amount of information available online is immense. There are true crime YouTube videos with analysis from attorneys to people who have been in prison. There are other YouTube videos with recorded interviews, social media, official case discovery, evidence documentation and witness interviews, interviews with law enforcement, law enforcement interviews with Chris Watts, letters between Chris Watts and author Cherlyn Cadle and more.

There is something about this story and its tragedy that makes me feel a profound responsibility to write about it. Perhaps in the hopes of making some sense out of it — or possibly helping another woman pick up a sign or a red flag, she might otherwise not have.

Here is my first article that started this.

After finishing the above article, I was scrolling through Medium. I discovered two more pieces on the Shanann and Chris Watts story — by Shannon Ashley. My write-up was striving to answer why we are fascinated and drawn in by these horrific murders?

Shannon Ashley takes a much more in-depth approach.

She discusses the toxic male culture that produces and enables a man like Chris Watts — and excuses the very behavior that makes some of the red flags invisible.

Ashley’s main point is that Chris Watts was a seething, passive-aggressive narcissist. He was done with his wife as his narcissistic supply once he had a new girlfriend in Nichol Kessinger. His mother and sister, who were unusually possessive toward Watts, encouraged this toxicity towards his wife — and made it easy for him to devalue her and cast her aside.

Chris Watts blamed everyone but himself for his actions. He even blamed his girlfriend. Nothing was his fault. It was all due to some outside, other force. And his family helped him with that narrative. They propped him up and forgave him no matter how evil a monster he became. Sure, kill our grandchildren, it’s ok. We love you.

I was married to a man with a mother and sister who were just like that. My husband did not want them to know about our wedding until the invitations were mailed because he didn’t want them to ruin our wedding. My husband wound up getting brain cancer before any of that could happen. That toxic family stuff kills — one way or another.

In this second article, Shannon Ashley points out how the Netflix documentary did not tell the whole story.

And I could not agree more. Shannon’s articles and her points of view riveted me. Embedded in this one, in my opinion, is the best documentary about the murders so far. Shannon challenged me to look deeper. I don’t know if I could have immersed myself further without going to a dark place.

Many details are left out of the Netflix film.

She goes on to say that Netflix leaves out the neighbors’ accounts of loud arguments (completely dispelling the idea that the couple never argued). Also left out are the couple’s financial issues and the extent of the relationship with Nichol Kessinger — not to mention another version of the murders themselves — an even uglier version. That blew my mind the most in Shannon’s story — was the account of the murders that Chris Watts gave author Cherlyn Cadle who wrote the book Letters From Christopher.

There is much speculation that Kessinger was more involved in the crimes; however, once Chris Watts confessed, the investigation ended according to Agent Tammy Lee.

There are also many points of view out there — those that want to “blame the victim.” That says Shanann was bossy and controlling. That he finally “snapped.” I honestly don’t care if she berated him to a pulp. There’s always a choice. There is never, ever a reason to kill. That’s what divorce is for.

My takeaways from a deeper dive.

I took another look and spent about 14 hours reviewing videos, transcripts, commentary, articles, and more on the case. Here are some takeaways that are slightly different from what these other articles have covered.

Most agree that Watts continues to lie about the murders’ facts because every time he tells the story, it changes. The truth may never be known. And, when he writes to Cadle that he “thinks she gave birth” immediately after he killed Shanann — she could not have. The “coffin birth” referred to in the autopsy did not happen until the body’s decomposition was well underway. Not immediately after death. He claimed he did not see the autopsy reports, yet he uses facts from them to alter his story about Shanann’s death.

I agree with Shannon Ashley about Watts’ narcissism and have also heard the reports that he has a big following. He gets many letters and has a regular female visitor that shows up once a week named “Ana.” Watts claims to have found God and thinks that he has a chance that he might get out someday. Cadle talks about Watts as being “delusional and that he hopes someday Nichol will come back to him by writing a letter in code.” Also, he makes statements like, “it happened to me” as though he is the victim in the crime and not the murderer.

Discussing Chris Watts’s mother, father, and sister. It appears that their values and attitude towards Shanann enabled Chris to somehow see her as “less than.” Somewhere in all of the documentation is mention of how elated Cindy Watts was when Chris said he was leaving his pregnant wife. Others have commented in this case about his mother and sister being abnormally possessive. They had normalized his dysfunctional behavior and in a way he felt justified in mistreating his family, especially Shanann.

When there was finally a massive blow-up between Shanann and Cindy over what came to be called “nut gate,” — it allowed Chris’ passive-aggressiveness to seethe further to the surface.

During his prison interview in February 2019, he still does not fully take responsibility — even when he talks about killing his family. He discusses it in a detached way. “I never thought I’d be in prison for the rest of my life.” Then he seems to be so worried about what the agents and investigators think of him. He says, “I don’t want you to think I’m cold-hearted I just don’t show much emotion.” And then, at another point in the conversation (part 2), “it takes a long time for me to forgive myself.”

So, there was a recipe for disaster brewing with this family that no one could see from the outside:

1. They were having marital problems. Chris was fascinated and in the “honeymoon stage” with his girlfriend; she was demanding and jealous of Shanann.
2. Chris was withholding sex and emotional support from Shanann, which is a form of abuse. Shanann then questioned, poked and prodded — making an angry narcissist even angrier (she felt her world slipping).
3. There is a massive schism between his family and her family, and she no longer wants the children near his family. She “tells him what to tell his parents” (she demands that he stick up for her); that schism had existed since their wedding when his mother, father, and sister refused to attend. It’s an old wound.
4. As a result of the family pressure, his wife noticed he’s not emotionally “there “ — he’s seething. He no longer wants anything to do with her sexually (he’s having an affair).
5. They had financial problems and had declared bankruptcy. Because of Shanann and the children’s medical issues, they had massive medical bills. More pressure.
6. Shanann is a consultant for a multi-level marketing company. Possibly the structure of her job cost them money. The job was costing them intangibles.
7. Their privacy on social media. She was always on social media. He did not like it. Again, more pressure.
8. She needed to paint a picture of a perfect family, perfect life — the image she was selling for her vitamin patch products. There was a cultivated social media persona — which is why people find all of this so shocking that this happened. Her followers and everyone else that could see her posts on Facebook/social media feel like they have come to know her.
9. He saw himself as a victim of the situation. An angry, resentful victim.
10. She was becoming further along in her pregnancy. He did not want the baby and had unsuccessfully tried to cause her to miscarry by drugging her with oxycontin in North Carolina.
11. Family annihilators are most likely to be white males in their thirties. They are most likely to commit the act in August, just before school. And — they usually commit suicide. — FBI Agent Brad Garrett
12. He wanted a new life with his girlfriend Nichol, who was pressuring him to leave his wife and children.
13. Shanann and the kids spent several weeks away — which allowed him the time to devolve into what he wanted instead of the role he was playing as husband and father. He didn’t want to let go of that new existence, and Shanann was in his way.

When Shanann Watts got home on the morning of August 13th at about 2 am from a business trip, she had no idea what was in front of her. She was about to be ambushed.

She went to bed and was killed and dragged out of the house in a sheet. Her children were treated no better by their father-turned-monster. We know how the rest of the story ends.

October is domestic violence awareness month.

SAFETY ALERT: If you are in danger, please use a safer computer and consider calling 911. The National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1–800–799–7233 / TTY 1–800–787–3224 or the StrongHearts Native Helpline at 1−844–762–8483 are available to assist you.

Please review these safety tips.

Jennifer Friebely is a New York-based content writer covering stories from personal development, marketing, and productivity to politics and music to whatever idea strikes. She has a 30+ year background in marketing and advertising and holds a BA in Political Science. Email her at [email protected].