More details continue to surface about the investigation into the disappearances and death of Shanann Watts and her two young daughters, as People magazine has confirmed more about what led to Chris Watts’s arrest on August 15, two days after his pregnant wife and daughters Bella, 4, and Celeste, suddenly vanished.
People compiled a timeline of the days and hours leading to Chris Watts’s arrest, based on documents released by the Weld County District Attorney’s office this and interviews with sources close to the investigation. Following Chris’s sentencing earlier this week, District Attorney Michael Rourke revealed at a news conference that investigators noticed there were sheets missing from the family’s home in Frederick, Colorado.
According to the People report, additional bedsheets were found in the trash at the home, apparently pulled from the master bed. On August 15, investigators reportedly traced Chris’s movements using the GPS on his truck, and used drones for an aerial search to help reconstruct his activities. That afternoon, the drone search located a bed sheet at a property owned by Chris’s employer — and it was a match to sheets found in the trash at the home.
Chris Watts was arrested hours later.
Earlier the same day, a woman came forward to police, admitting that she had been having an affair with Watts. Nichol Kessinger told the Denver Post last week that she believed Chris and Shanann were finalizing their divorce, but realized after Shanann and her daughters went missing that Chris had been lying to her – and that he left out the detail about his wife’s pregnancy.
“I thought, ‘If he was able to lie to me and hide something that big, what else was he lying about?’” Kessinger said in the interview.
According to People, Chief Deputy District Attorney Steve Wrenn said that Watts appeared to understand that his back was up against a wall when he was confronted with evidence of his affair and the bed sheet found at the oil site.
“That’s ultimately when he changed directions with his story dramatically,” Wrenn said.
As CrimeOnline previously reported, Watts initially tried to claim that he killed Shanann in a rage after purportedly seeing her strangle Celeste via a baby monitor in their home, but later confessed to all three murders in a plea deal that spared him the death penalty.
Watts was sentenced to three life terms without the possibility of parole on Monday, with more than 80 years added on to his sentence for additional charges, including unlawful termination of a pregnancy.
