The parents of Christopher Watts continue to support their son even after he pleaded guilty November 6 to murdering his pregnant wife Shanann, and his daughters, four-year-old Bella and three-year-old Celeste.
“There’s not one person you can talk to that will say anything about this kid,” Watts’ mother Cindy Watts told WTVD. “He was normal, he didn’t have a temper, he was just easy-going like his Dad. He’s not a monster.”
She and her husband Ronnie Watts say they believe the story their son allegedly detailed in the police affidavit. According to cops, the defendant said that yes, he killed Shanann, but only because she fatally strangled their daughters after he asked for a separation.
That flat-out contradicts the terms of Chris Watts’ guilty plea. He admitted to all nine counts, as originally charged. Investigators claimed he hid the victims’ bodies on property belonging to his then-employer.
In the document obtained by Law&Crime, he admitted causing the death of not just Shanann, but their daughters.
The couple suggested that he pleaded guilty because he believed he was already going to get life in prison for killing Shanann and hiding the girls’ bodies.
“I just want to make sure he’s doing the right thing,” Chris Watts’ father said. “If he didn’t kill the children, I want him to say so, then let them prove it.”
The reporter asked them “What happened to that kid from Pine Forest High School?”
“What happened to that kid from Pine Forest High School?” Cindy said. “He met Shanann. That’s what happened to him.”
The couple reportedly said they believed their daughter-in-law was dangerous, and that they didn’t go to the wedding. Cindy Watts went so far as to say that Shanann Watts was “more capable” of killing the children than her son was.
“I would say she’s more capable than Christopher,” she said.
“Christopher, I don’t see him capable at all but if something happened that night and that did happen — God forbid if it did happen — what was the trigger? Why? What happened? I just want the truth because he’s not the sociopath next door,” she said. “He’s not the kind of person that would do something like that. I have to know why. I have to know. It’s important to me.”
Shanann’s family pushed back on the couple’s “vicious, grotesque, and utterly false statements” about her. The statement read, in part:
Monday evening, the parents of Chris Watts gave an interview in which they attempted to defend their son. In doing so, they felt the need to make vicious, grotesque and utterly false statements about Shanann. Their false statements, however hurtful and inaccurate, will never alter the truth about Shanann, and will never alter the truth about the crimes committed by their son, Chris Watts.
Chris Watts’ sentencing hearing is set for Monday.
[Mugshot via Weld County Sheriff’s Office]
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