Where Is Chris Watts From ‘American Murder: The Family Next Door’ Now?

American Murder: The Family Next Door on Netflix is a gruesome new true-crime documentary about the 2018 Watts family murders. Told entirely through archival police footage, social media posts, text messages, and home video, it’s a chilling, but morbidly fascinating up-close look at Chris Watts, a man who eventually confessed to murdering his pregnant wife and two young daughters in cold blood.

Directed by Jenny Popplewell, American Murder: The Family Next Door is not an easy watch. And yet, as Netflix has proven time and time again, there’s a huge market for grizzly true crime docs, no matter how gruesome. And the case of the Watts family murders—which has been the subject of public obsession for over two years now—is without a doubt the perfect fit for Netflix’s true crime audience. Even for those who already know the story of the case, American Murder: The Family Next Door provides shocking police footage of Chris Watts mere hours after he murdered his family, as well as the moment of his confession. It’s hard to look away.

WHO IS CHRIS WATTS FROM AMERICAN MURDER: THE FAMILY NEXT DOOR?

Chris Watts is a convicted murderer who confessed to the killing of Shannan Watts and their two daughters, four-year-old Bella and three-year-old Celeste, on August 13, 2018, in Frederick, Colorado. Chris and Shannan Watts were married for six years, but, as their text messages reveal, he had been growing distant from her. On the morning of Shannan’s disappearance, police footage shows Chris speaking to officers about his wife, claiming to have no idea where she is. He made several media appearances pleading for his wife to come home.

After failing a polygraph test, Watts confessed to having an affair with another woman, and, eventually, to killing his wife. Watts initially told police that he and Shannan had argued about separating and that Shannan, in a fit of rage, had strangled their two children to death. He said he “freaked out” and strangled Shannan when he saw this. However, later he confessed to killing his wife first, and then murdering his children as well.

WHERE IS CHRIS WATTS NOW?

After Watts confessed to killing his wife and his children, he pled guilty to multiple accounts of murder in court on November 6, 2018. On November 19, he was sentenced to five life sentences, three consecutive and two concurrent, without the possibility of parole.  He received an additional 48 years for the unlawful termination of his wife’s pregnancy and 36 years for three charges of tampering with a deceased body. With the support of Shannan’s family, the death penalty was not pursued, as part of Watts’s plea deal.

Watts was moved from a corrections facility in Colorado to a maximum-security prison, Dodge Correctional Institution, in Waupun, Wisconsin in December 2018. He was moved out of safety concerns, according to a local NBC news report. He has remained in prison in Wisconsin for the last two years.

Watch American Murder: The Family Next Door