What happened to a man convicted of murdering his pregnant wife and daughters

The harrowing true story of a man who killed his pregnant wife and two young children after discovering he was having an affair is set to be told on Channel 5.

Christopher Watts strangled his pregnant wife Shannan and then smothered his two young daughters Bella and Celeste in August 2018.

His heinous crime has already been the subject of a Netflix documentary American Murder: The Family Next Door.

Now the documentary The Man Who Murdered His Family: A Suburban Nightmarewhich will air on Channel 5 on Wednesday October 2 at 10pm, explores this shocking crime committed in the US state of Colorado.

A look back at the man at the heart of an affair that stunned an entire nation.

Who is Christopher Watts and what has he done?

Christopher Watts was an oil operator from North Carolina, who moved with his family to Frederick, Colorado, to work for Anadarko Petroleum.

He married Shanann Rzucek in 2013 after meeting her on Facebook in 2010.

They had daughter Bella Marie Watts in December 2013 and Celeste Cathryn Watts in July 2015. At the time of her death, Shanann, 34, was 15 weeks pregnant with a son, who was to be named Nico.

However, their seemingly happy family life came to an abrupt and abrupt end on August 13, 2018.

Shanann had returned home from a business trip to Arizona in the early hours of Monday, August 13 and she and her daughters were reported missing by her friend Nickole Atkinson later the same day when she did not respond to messages and failed to show up for a hospital or professional appointment. meeting.

Christopher Watts was at work that day. Police then searched the family home and found no sign of Shanann or her daughters, aged three and four.

Watts participated in media appeals to find his family, but when he took a police polygraph test, he failed.

He later admitted to his father Ronnie that he had killed Shanann, but claimed he did it because she had smothered their daughters.

He was arrested and told police the location of the bodies of his wife and children.

He had suffocated his children and pushed them into crude oil storage tanks. Shanann was buried in a shallow grave.

On August 21, Watts was charged with three counts of first-degree murder, including an additional count per child cited as “death of a child who had not yet attained the age of 12 and the defendant was in a position of trust. unlawful termination of pregnancy and three counts of tampering with the deceased human body.

Several months later, on November 6, Watts pleaded guilty to the murders and was sentenced to five life sentences without the possibility of parole. He was not sentenced to death at the request of Shanann’s family, who did not want more deaths.

Before his guilty plea, it emerged Watts had had an affair with a co-worker and told his lawyer he killed Shanann after an argument over a divorce.

Where is Christopher Watts now?

Although convicted in Colorado, Watts was transferred to a Wisconsin prison in December 2018 due to “security concerns.”

He has been incarcerated at the maximum security prison at Dodge Correctional Institution in Waupun since 2018.

A source told an American magazine People in 2019, Watts “has nothing to do but think” while incarcerated.

“He thinks every day about what he did,” they said, “he is tormented by his past and the mistakes he made.”

The 39-year-old is believed to be in protective custody and working as a guard, carrying out tasks such as cleaning.