Chris Watts may face the death penalty for murdering his pregnant wife and daughters

On August 20, the State of Colorado accused Christopher Watts of killing his pregnant wife and his two daughters, so he faces nine criminal charges, three of the murder in the first degree.

The accusation was formalized just over a week after a friend of the family denounced the disappearance of Shanann Watts, 34, and her daughters, Bella, 4, and Celeste, 3, which led to the authorities to an investigation and to ….. Watts last Wednesday as the main suspect.

The defendant, who is in jail without bail, was a former worker of a Colorado oil plant that, according to his own confession, on August 13 killed his wife in a "rage attack", after she did the same with their two daughters inside the home, located in Frederick, a city of 8,600 people located about 50 kilometers north of Denver.

Christopher Watts, 33, explained to the police that, after telling his wife that he wanted to separate from her, he saw her through the wireless baby monitor he had installed in his house choking their little daughter.

When he arrived at the room, according to his version, he could do nothing to save the lives of any of his daughters, since the oldest was also dead on top of her bed. It would be at this moment when blinded by anger, Watts would have strangled his wife. Read more on our Twitter account, @amomama_usa.

According to the police report, the bodies were found by police officers and dogs in two different locations within an oil extraction site of the Anadarko Petroleum company, where Watts worked until his dismissal, which occurred on the same day of his arrest.

The discovery was made thanks to the confession of the alleged murderer, collected in an affidavit and the purpose of the hiding place would have been to hide the smell of decomposing corpses.

Watts also confessed that he maintained an extramarital relationship with a co-worker, which is why he would have proposed the option of separating his current wife.

The couple, who faced financial difficulties since 2015, when he filed for bankruptcy, dragged debts that amounted to $ 70,000, according to local media.

The couple had prepared a party for the announcement to their friends and family of the sex of the new baby, Shannan was at the time 15 weeks of pregnancy.

The child's own mother had uploaded to her Facebook account a video showing Watts' reaction when she told him about the news of her pregnancy. "It's amazing, I guess when you want, it happens," she said sporting sunglasses and smiling as she held the pregnancy test.

The tragic event has surprised family and friends, who at no time believed Watts capable of doing something like this. In fact, in social media, his wife Shanann had published several images with her daughters and her husband, whom she defined as "the best dad girls could have" and "the best husband in the world."

Before being arrested, Watts himself gave a television interview requesting the return of his family when they were still disappeared: "I hope they are somewhere safe and if someone has them and they are not safe, I want them back right now," he said. A day later he was arrested.

District Attorney Michael Rourke explained that the girls had died before the mother, probably a day earlier, when Shanann Watts was out of Colorado for work reasons, and that the bodies of the girls were allegedly "for several days in a tank full of crude oil.”

On September 13, a district attorney's office spokeswoman made it clear that capital punishment is not off the table. The district attorney has until early next year to make an official decision about weighing the death penalty when the case goes to trial.

According to Café Mom, since the death penalty was reinstated in 1975 in Colorado, only 14 cases have ended in death sentences.

The story resembles the Benett’s case; a man that killed his wife at sea in 2017 during their honeymoon in an effort to inherit the home she owned in Delray Beach, Florida.