Cindy Watts still describes her son Chris as a good person and rejects his admission that he murdered his daughters. He’s serving life without parole for killing his pregnant wife, Shanann, and their children, Bella and Celeste, in 2018.
In an interview with Melissa G. Moore, whose father is serial killer Keith Jesperson, Cindy defended the son who confessed to killing all 3. Moore said Cindy still believes Chris’s original account: that Shanann killed the girls and he killed Shanann. Chris later admitted that story was false.
On August 13, 2018, in Colorado, Chris strangled Shanann, 34, and smothered Bella, 4, and Celeste, 3. He disposed of their bodies at an oil site. He also admitted he’d been having an affair.
“I’m not saying he shouldn’t be in jail,” Cindy said. “He killed his wife, but why the girls? There’s no way he could put the girls in that eight-inch hole… It’s not how he is, it’s just not.”
Chris pleaded guilty, and the case never went to trial. His sentence included 3 consecutive life terms without parole, plus 48 years and another 36 years to be served consecutively.
Cindy said she wanted a trial where he could present a defense and deny killing his daughters. She said Chris told his parents he didn’t want to put his family through a trial.
His father, Ronnie, is still seeking the unredacted discovery material, according to Chris’s sister, Jamie. “My poor dad, almost close to 70, still trying to find answers,” she said. Moore said Cindy worries about Chris’s safety in prison and questions whether she and Ronnie did something wrong.
Cindy also defended Chris publicly in 2018, calling him “not a sociopath” and “not a psychopath.” In the interview with Moore, she said parents should keep searching for explanations before accepting someone else’s judgment of their child.
“Any parent would do the same for their child,” Cindy said. “They’d be exactly like us. They’d go down every rabbit hole and look at everything before letting anyone else tell them who their child is, or what his heart is really like.”
Boy moms are never beating the allegations.
