'Cause I Freaked Out,' Chilling Interrogation Video Shows Chris Watts Confess To His Father Ronnie That He Murdered Shanann

Chris Watts was sentenced last week to life in prison without parole for each of the three murders he confessed to committing back in August: his pregnant wife Shanann, 34, and daughters Bella, 4, and Celeste 3.

This week, the Weld County District Attorney released video of his police interrogations, which include when he confessed to killing his wife. Oxygen.com has obtained the video clips.

At first, Watts claimed that he had no idea what happened to his family but did explain that they had an argument before they vanished.

"Obviously it's getting pretty emotional," Watts told detectives, describing the conversation. "We're talking about we felt the disconnection was there. We're falling out of love."

A detective tells Watts that information doesn’t look good for Watts.

"The day [Shannan] goes missing is the day you guys have marital discord," he said. "You can understand what I'm thinking about you."

Watts then maintains his innocence.

"It honestly just makes me sick to my stomach because this is something that I would never do," Watts said. "There's no way I would harm anybody in my family at all. I am telling you the absolute truth."

Detectives get him to change his tune after telling him he failed a polygraph test.

"It is completely clear that you were not honest during the testing," a detective told Watts. "And I think you already know that. You did not pass the polygraph test."

After that revelation, police brought in Watts' father Ronnie, who was wearing a polo shirt with “Papa Ronnie” embroidered on the chest, to the interrogation room. They embrace in a hug in the clip.

Chris whispered to his father, referencing his wife, “She...she smothered them...they were smothered.”

He went on to claim he didn’t hear anything. During the father-son talk, Ronnie sits solemnly, his tone soft spoken while his son appears tensed up, head down.

“When I was downstairs, I came back up and they were gone. I don't know, like, me tal- talta- talkin' to her about that…tal- talkin' to her about the separation and everything…about, like… I don't know, like, what else to say. Like, 'cause I freaked out and I did the same thing to f___kin’ her. Those were my kids.”

He said he heard “little commotion” upstairs and went up to find his wife on top of their daughter Celeste, choking her.

“They—they were blue,” he said, and his father asked “Both of them?” and Chris said yes. 

Ronnie then asked, “So then what’d you do…haul the bodies off or somethin’?”

When talking about choking Shanann to death, Chris said, “Mm hm...that’s just…it’s rage.”

After saying that, Ronnie wiped his hand over his face in what appears to be grief and shock.

“Good God Almighty son,” he replied. Then Ronnie puts his arm onto the table and rests his forehead in one hand. He is visibly distraught.

Investigators then enter the room and he repeats the same story, which is later proven to be a lie, to them.

"My babies are gone and I put my hands around my wife's neck and I did that same thing."

He went on to call his wife evil.

"The evil that I saw when I walked behind Shannan when she was behind [Celeste]," Chris claimed. "I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what to f___in do. None of this made sense!"

The investigators then pressed him on why he didn’t call 911 if that was true.

They offered the suggestion to Chris that the girls could have been revived.

When police asked why he concealed the bodies on an oil site, he claimed he “was scared. I just felt such anger that [...] I didn't feel anything.”

Then, they told Chris Watts that he is a monster.

"I'm not that monster I didn't kill my babies," Watts said.

In the end though, he of course confessed to killing all of them.

[Photo: Weld County District Attorney’s Office]