Chris Watts Blamed an “Evil Outside Source” for Killing His Pregnant Wife and Children in a Newly Released Letter

Instagram Facebook Facebook Twitter Twitter Amazon TikTok TikTok Thought Catalog Diamond Mark Camera Collective World FlagLink Loading Arrow Pointing Down Skip to content The Daily Mail has published excerpts of a letter Chris Watts wrote to his deceased wife in 2020. In it, he wrote “I promise the man you married isn’t the man who turned his back on his family. That man was an aberration brought on by an evil outside source. You know the husband and dad I am and would testify to that today.”

Watts killed Shanann while she was pregnant and their daughters, Bella and Celeste, in 2018.

Watts opened with a birthday greeting to Shanann: “Hey boo! Happy Birthday! Thirty-six years young today.” He recalled a joke between them: “This is the first time of year when I could always say you’re ‘two’ years older than me. You didn’t like that too much, but I liked messing with you.”

He later wrote: “There’s so much I wish I could say to you and make up for what I did to our family. No one needed to go through this. You and our babies had a long life ahead of them and deserved to see that life.”

Watts imagined his family speaking to him: “I look outside my window and wonder what we would be doing and then I get this overwhelming feeling you’re looking at me with our babies saying, ‘We love you!’” The “We love you!” in that passage is what he imagined them saying.

He wrote about their memory in religious terms: “All of you are a blessing to my life and your memory lives in my soul every waking moment. I close my eyes and imagine the light of God shining across your cheeks and radiant smiles beaming down from Heaven when you look down upon us.” He continued: “The love you felt down here won’t compare to the love you feel up there — God’s love — and I’ve dedicated the rest of my time on this earth to showing the love He has shown me.”

Watts’s parents, Cindy and Ronnie Watts, obtained the letter during a prison visit and read it at Shanann’s and the girls’ graves. Cindy has said she doesn’t believe he killed the girls, though he pleaded guilty to their murders after initially denying them. The letter comes from the book ‘Killer in the Family’ by Melissa G. Moore and Michele Matrisciani.

Watts is serving 5 life sentences without parole at Dodge Correctional Institution in Waupun, Wisconsin. Separately, the Daily Mail reported in late September 2026 that he’d called off a planned prison wedding with Lizzie Henderson because he believed God was telling him to.

He closed the letter: “Cheer me on as I walk the path God is putting in front of me. I love you all to the moon and back! Love, Chris.”

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