INTERROGATOR: Um, so…what-what can you tell me about Shan’ann and Chris, and their relationship?
FRANK: Um, he was a great father.
INTERROGATOR: Kay.
FRANK: I mean, I couldn’t ask for a better father for the kids. Honestly, he did everything for them. Um, played with them, bathed them, I mean…I mean I couldn’t ask for someone better.
INTERROGATOR: Husband-wise.
FRANK: Same way. Um, never seen any kind of problems with him. I was here – prior to the six weeks she was here – I don’t really know that day…they both went on a vacation with her Thrive company…um…watched the kids…um…there was a little bit of difference in ’em…um…but i just took it as being a father. I mean, he was getting a little sterner with the girls. I mean it was nothing. You know, he was always the quiet type with them.
INTERROGATOR: Hm-hm.
FRANK: But he was getting a little sterner with them. I just took it as him being a father. Um, but a lot of different things was going on. I mean, he did change his um…they were going through thisnew Thrive stuff, or she was selling, and he started himself all built up and lost a lot of weight…um…they did come out, um, Shan’ann came out for six weeks with the girls. They were going back and forth from our house to his house, his mother’s house…and little Celeste had allergies to nuts, tree nuts, and very allergic to ’em, very allergic to ’em…
At 01:27 in the clip below, while Cindy Watts is making her statement beside the wooden lectern in court [under the chaperoneship of Denver attorney Jean Powers], she abruptly turns to Watts who is sitting behind her.
“We love you, and we [turns, sobs] forgive you son.”
But he doesn’t look up at her.
Does he blame Cindy for Shan’ann’s July 9th meltdown and for fomenting the early breakdown in their relationship?
The Discovery Documents are like a giant haystack, a Mount Everest of evidence, yet the mountain itself seems to obscure the fact that there’s nothing there. Important needles that should there are missing. There are no crime scene photos, for example, released by official police photographers, in fact, it’s still not even clear where the “crime scene” was in the Watts home.
There is also no certainty about time of death, order of death or even motive. If this wasn’t problematic enough, in the aftermath of the status conference [which ended up being a “surprise plea deal”] the defendant’s mother took to the media to bang the drum that her son was coerced into taking the plea deal, and was doing all she could to “scuttle the plea deal before it was too late”, as one 9News reporter put it.
That narrative also swirled into nothing. Just as suddenly as it manifested it swirled quietly down a drain and disappeared.
In hindsight we can see that despite Cindy’s attempts in the week before the sentencing hearing, the plea deal wasn’t scuttled. In court Cindy’s lawyer/representative said the media blitz she’d initiated was because they were “misinformed”. Judge Kopcow accepted that, he decided the plea wasn’t co-erced, Chris Watts maintained a mute though slightly tearful silence in court, and the rest – as they say – is history.
The history of this case is filled with weird mismatches, incongruencies and downright deceits. Let’s examine 7 Serious Inconsistencies, starting with Shan’ann Watts herself.
1. “Shan’ann Watts was excited and happy to have children” versus “I don’t want to have this baby…I’m not happy”
2. “Chris Watts wasn’t excited or happy about the third pregnancy” versus “Little Peanut! Love her/him already!!!”
It feels like it’s taking things too far to suggest Shan’ann’s expropriation of Watts’ social media extended to making declarations of his joy and happiness at the arrival of the third baby on his behalf. And yet she did indirectly do exactly this by posting screengrabs of his reaction and letting the whole world know about it. She was also adamant in her pregnancy announcement posts that the pregnancy was all his idea.
If that’s the case, and it probably was, then Watts clearly had a change of heart almost immediately after the baby was conceived. It’s not like that’s never happened in human history. And the seed for the family holocaust that followed began with the announcement – ultimately – of an unwelcome arrival at an “inappropriate” time.
Shan’ann’s excessive social media posting, including about the pregnancy, placed him and her in a bind. Now that the whole world, including the Thriver cabal, knew about the pregnancy, they were both locked-in. They couldn’t back out even if they wanted to, unless they wished to court a social death for the mortal sin of giving up their child or aborting it.
3. Nichol Kessinger claimed she didn’t know Shan’ann’s name “for a while”. How long and when exactly was that “while”?
More pertinent is once Kessinger did know about Shan’ann, then what? Did she see Shan’ann’s happy family fairy tale spiels on Facebook and dismiss them, or did she cynically think they were just part of vacuous Thrive promotion, and held no actual meaning [which has evidently proved to be the case].
4. Nichole Kessinger maintained that she didn’t know Shan’ann was pregnant, and found out via the media around August 14th, after her disappearance.
Kessinger also claimed when she found out about the pregnancy [sometime in August after the disappearance] and confronted Chris Watts, he told her the baby wasn’t is. But what if she did know? How could she not know when Shan’ann posted the first video on May 29 and the changed her profile picture to “Oops we did it again” on June 11th.
What if she did know before the murders that Watts’ wife was pregnant?
A cursory glance at Shan’ann’s public Facebook page during June and July [when Kessinger’s affair supposedly began] would have confirmed not just a happy family narrative, but the fact that Shan’ann was happily pregnant too.
If Kessinger did know about the pregnancy, why did she persist with the affair?
5. If Kessinger was aware of the pregnancy, then she HAD to have seen red flags, including seeing herself as potentially creating one by the process of actively tearing her partner away from his newly pregnant wife
5. Shan’ann’s parents say they had no clue Shan’ann’s marriage was falling apart
Sandi claims she had no idea Shan’ann’s marriage was falling apart, even though Shan’ann and Chris Watts slept in their home for several days during the first week of August, Watts refused to touch his wife and Shan’ann slept alone. Shan’ann also claimed, during that week, that she cried herself to sleep each night. Did her parents not know this?
6. Shan’ann was a very controlling, OCD type personality.
Her personality as a factor that may have caused Watts [wrongly of course] to assume he couldn’t “come clean” to her about the affair, or about not wanting the baby, was likely an important factor in the underlying dynamic that made him feel locked-in.
7. Does the DA know the motive or doesn’t he?
Does the DA know the motive and won’t tell, or does he not know why this crime happened? Which is worse? \
It’s difficult to imagine the DA can’t have a clear motive, even though the cops, CBI and FBI were on the case, and Watts confessed and struck a plea deal with the DA.
There are other factors that don’t make sense, such as the secrecy surrounding the autopsy reports, the rushing of the legal process and avoidance of a criminal trial, and the strange argument around avoiding the death penalty when everyone knows the death penalty was never any issue to anyone in the first place.
So why is the Chris Watts case so peculiar in so many respects?
Looks like the inside of a hotel lobby. I can’t shake the feeling though that we’ve been drowned in fluff. Most of the footage that’s been released has virtually no substance.
There’s already one nonsensical conspiracy theory based around distortions in the Trinastich surveillance video, that Watts had an accomplice. So I want to be careful not to add to the nonsense.
The video, which is flagrantly defamatory in its accusation, has since been removed, as it should be.
In Shan’ann’s Mother’s Day video shot in the lounge of 2825 Saratoga Trail on May 13th, we can clearly see the bulging lattice in the second-last wrought-iron wrung from the very bottom is intact.
We also get an up-close view of the impression of the carpet as it normally appears. We can see that the carpet does have certain areas of shading, produced by dirt, foot traffic and cleaning.
In video footage of the K9 handler searching the lounge on August 14th, the lattice seems intact. Although, compared to the two above it, it seems less intact – if that makes sense. This could just be a distortion in the video, and as we all know, motion and digital can and does produce fine distortions. So I’m not sure we can rule that out.
There are two more images which appear to show the left hand whirl of the lattice has been damaged, even ripped open.
Readers are encouraged to do their own detective work in this regard. Unfortunately none of the Bodycam footage hovers for any length of time around this crucial area of the house.
Personally I don’t undertstand it. Shan’ann’s suitcase was the last artifact of herself she left behind, indicating her final movements when she arrived home that fateful night. So why not look carefully at the damn suitcase, and that area of the stairs!
UPDATE: At 07:26 in the video below the bodycam footage is clear and unambiguous – the lattice at the bottom is intact.
The footage also shows excellent close-up video of the staircase carpet, but unfortunately not at the bottom of the stairs, or to the right of the railing.
Right at the end of the video, as the officer is looking in to the rear seat of the truck [where he loaded the bodies], Watts interrupts, and suggests “getting the card”. This is presumably a bank card to help provide details of the finances.
His resistance about providing any financial information is a huge red flag. We still don’t know exactly what the state was of the Watts family’s finances at the time of the murders.
This 2 hour interview is from August 23rd at around 21:00 MST. It’s labelled “2nd interview” but it was actually her fourth or fifth. It may be the second video/recorded interview.
This footage confirms something that’s been frustratingly difficult to establish for sure. It may seem like a silly detail, but I wanted to know where Deeter was and why no one heard him when Nickole Atkinson came knocking.
Thanks to this footage, that mystery has been solved. Deeter was in the basement, which from the neighbor’s perspective, was virtually soundproof. From someone standing at the front door, you can just barely hear the dog barking when Officer Coonrod shouts Shan’ann’s name [see second Instagram clip below].
What this also shows is the lack of detail and holes in perception even when there are three different people on the scene. None of them made note of the dog because they didn’t think it was important. But locking Deeter in the basement should have been the first sign that Shan’ann wasn’t at a friend’s house. She wouldn’t have left the dog there when she went out, she’d have let him outside in the back garden [most likely]. Or, if she left the house, the dog would have free run of the main level, assuming the motion detectors were turned off or tuned to ignore doggy-sized disturbances.
The other aspect is leaving Deeter in an almost soundproof basement shows a) that Watts didn’t want the dog attracting the attention of nosy neighbors [remember, after the murders he was completely on his own for almost nine hours, from 05:00 to 14:00, and if everything had gone according to plan, Watts would only have arrived home at 17:00 or 18:00. 13 hours is a long time for a dog to be left on its own, especially for a dachshund. It also shows b) Watts’ postmeditation. How he “took care of the dog” demonstrates the amount of meticulous thinking [only some of which we’re aware of thus far] that went into the premeditation.
Notice this outside porch light [below] was left on; unless it’s motion activated, it may be further sign of Watts’ hasty exit earlier that morning.
It’s also worth noting that the neighbor also had a dog, which means if Deeter was barking for a length of time, the neighbor’s dog would start barking “in sympathy”, something Watts would want to avoid.
Even when Coonrod scoots down to peer in the basement, he doesn’t see or hear Deeter. This may be because Deeter was sequestered in the basement stairway, assuming there was a door or barrier of some kind at the bottom as well.
It’s also possible Coonrod simply didn’t see the dog in the darkness and clutter inside. But it’s unlikely the dog didn’t see the officer. If he did, he’d have scampered around and barked at the would-be intruder.
Final point. Notice how when Watts opens the front door he immediately turns away, towards the wall, and walks quickly to the kitchen. Once Coonrod is in the kitchen he strides quickly to the basement. Coonrod is still trying to get his attention, talk to him and catch up. When Coonrod asks if he can look around, Watts says yes, appears to go somewhere, but then abruptly reappears. Watts had a lot of on-scene cleaning up and picking-up to do that he hadn’t anticipated when he left that morning.
This is another version of what probably happened in the Ramsey home for seven hours while the cops were in the house, and the friends they’d invited into the crime scene, while JonBenet lay dead inside. Crimes aren’t just covered up immediately after they’re committed, when they’re premeditated there is covering up before [removing data from phone and other devices, deactivating Facebook], at the scene with officers present, and Watts was still in clean up mode on the night of August 13th.
Shan’ann’s suitcase at the bottom of the stairs wasn’t the same as the suitcases she took to North Carolina.
It was a smaller black case, ideal for a two day trip.
Another maddening aspect of the tsunami of coverage is that there are only fleeting glimpses of the suitcase. You’d think the cops would start at that point, the last known point where Shan’ann left a trace of herself from the trip, but instead they’re everywhere else except looking at the case at the bottom of the stairs.
These are some of the glimpses I’ve been able to grab of it thus far.
My impression was that the suitcase was left right at the foot of the stairs, but this case has been placed to the side of it, which would have taken two or three steps. Furthermore, Watts has left something of his own right beside it, a blue container, on the side of the case. It’s not clear what it is exactly.
While we’re on the subject of the suitcase, this footage provides some perspective of the motion detectors in the lounge. There appear to be just two, one in the corner by the couches, and another set higher up.
When one is standing at the foot of the stairs, the small protruding wall blocks the coverage of the upper sensor. Presumably the sensor can detect movement above the first landing on the staircase.
There’s a strange moment in the footage where the officer asks Watts for information about the doorbell camera. Watts, who has been one great big disappointment in terms of ideas, interest or contributions, suddenly hits his stride. Literally. To explain how well he understands the system, he jogs at the door and shows – demonstrates – to the officer EXACTLY where the range of the doorbell camera extends to.
There’s also another moment that was of interest to me, and will be of interest to those who have already read the TWO FACE series. When detective Baumhover and Watts stand below the staircase shooting the breeze, Watts initially appears relaxed, then darts a few glances at his feet and at the floor. If you view the footage carefully, he does this when the detective breaks eye contact and looks away. Nickole Atkinson is also in the room, on his right.
We know Watts’ key tell when he’s nervous is swaying side to side, curling his lower lip and folding his arms. He starts doing that here too.
When he is initially interrogated, in the kitchen, Watts is standing – from the perspective of the bodycam – between the view of the suitcase [and the stairs]. He’s blocking it, just as he seemed to do in Trinastich’s home when the officer wanted to view the surveillance footage.
I won’t go into the reasons here, but I believe exactly in this area where Watts is standing, Shan’ann was murdered. She never made it up the stairs, and she never got into bed. There was also no argument, in fact no communication between them after she arrived home. The murder was the only message Watts wanted to send.
But what about the Vivint alerts showing no activity on the main level for over two and a half hours? There’s a well known saying in law, and in true crime, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, or, as I like to put it: the absence of evidence is also evidence.
In the same way Watts was able to hide data on his phone using the Secret Calculator, he knew how to outwit his own home security system. The 01:48 motion alert in the lounge probably came from the overhead sensor, while the one in the corner was neutralized [either digitally turned off, or rendered blind with a piece of paper] until he was finished with his nocturnal work.
Watts was painfully aware of the intricacies of the Vivint system because, while Shan’ann was away, she asked him to repair the dodgy garage sensor.
Part of his dodgy explanation for Shan’ann leaving was that she left through the garage door. His point being, if she’d left that way, he’d have no way of knowing.
Maybe so, but he’d forgotten about the other sensor spying on his garage: Trisnatich’s.
In POST TRUTH, the 100th True Crime Rocket Science [TCRS] title, the world’s most prolific true crime author Nick van der Leek demonstrates how much we still don’t know in the Watts case. In the final chapter of the SILVER FOX trilogy the author provides a sly twist in a tale that has spanned 12 TCRS books to date. The result may shock or leave you with even more questions.
SILVER FOX III available now in paperback!
“If you are at all curious about what really happened in the Watts case, then buy this book, buy every one he has written and you will get as close as humanly possible to understanding the killer and his victims.”- Kathleen Hewtson. Purchase the very highly rated and reviewed SILVER TRILOGY – POST TRUTH COMING SOON.
TCRS MERCH available now – just in time for Christmas!
Book 5 – ALL NEW! “I have thoroughly enjoyed this audiobook…” – Connie Lukens. Drilling Through Discovery Complete Audiobook
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Book 4 in the TWO FACE series, one of the best reviewed, is available now in paperback!
“Book 4 in the K9 series is a must read for those who enjoy well researched and detailed crime narratives. The author does a remarkable job of bringing to life the cold dark horror that is Chris Watts throughout the narrative but especially on the morning in the aftermath of the murders. Chris’s actions are connected by Nick van der Leek’s eloquent use of a timeline to reveal a motive.”
Readers are encouraged to do their own detective work in this regard. Unfortunately none of the Bodycam footage hovers for any length of time around this crucial area of the house.
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