Chris Watts, Who Murdered His Pregnant Wife and Two Daughters, Plans to Marry from Prison

Eight years after he savagely murdered his wife and children, Chris Watts is planning on getting married again. Watts, convicted in 2018 of murdering his pregnant wife Shanann and daughters Bella, 4, and Celeste, 3, has applied to marry Lizzie Henderson, 39, after over 20 prison visits lasting up to three hours each in the past 15 months. Henderson has reportedly relocated from Ohio to Wisconsin to be near him, filed a name change to “Lizzie Watts,” and the couple submitted a prison marriage request.

Convicted family killer Chris Watts is hoping to become a married man again … this time from behind bars.

Watts, who is serving multiple life sentences for murdering his pregnant wife and their two young daughters, has reportedly applied to marry Lizzie Henderson, an Ohio realtor he met while incarcerated.

Henderson confirmed the relationship to the Daily Mail, acknowledging others may find it “weird” but declining to reveal how they met. She said their story is between herself, Watts and God.

TMZ

When Male Validation Becomes More Important Than Female Solidarity

We need to have a cold discussion about pick-me-ism. Because this case is peak pick-me-ism. For those unfamiliar, pick-me-ism describes the desperate pursuit of male validation by degrading other women or compromising one’s own values. And what we are witnessing with Chris Watts, a man who murdered his pregnant wife and two young daughters, is the ultimate expression of that pathology.

Let’s digest the facts. A woman has voluntarily chosen to marry a man who strangled his pregnant wife and smothered his two daughters, then stuffed their bodies into oil tanks. She bought her own engagement ring, moved states to be near him, and has visited him at least 20 times this year. She reportedly spent Christmas Day with him in prison. What kind of sick, demented woman does that?

The psychology behind it is well-documented. For some women, relationships with incarcerated men feel “safe.” They know exactly where he is. He cannot cheat on her with another woman or leave. He is completely dependent on her for connection to the outside world. There is a power imbalance in her favour, and for women with abandonment issues or trauma, that control can feel like safety.

Then there is the “I can fix him” delusion, coupled with the fantasy that she is the exception, the one woman special enough to reach the man nobody else could. It is the Joker and Harley Quinn romance made real, but with a family annihilator instead of a fictional clown.

When a Family Annihilator Becomes Someone Else’s Love Story

What makes this particularly grotesque is the context. Watts did not just kill his wife. Watts drove 45 minutes with his two daughters in the back seat, knowing he was going to kill them. The girls had 45 minutes of life left, and he had 45 minutes to change his mind. He did not. Instead, he forced their tiny bodies into oil tanks that were too small to hold them. To add insult to Shanann’s memory, he then attempted to claim that she had killed their daughters after he asked for a divorce, and that this was what drove him to kill her. This man is a monster.

And yet there are entire online communities dedicated to defending him, blaming his murdered wife for being “controlling” or in an MLM, as though that justifies her brutal death. The victim-blaming is staggering. Shanann Watts was a woman with lupus who was trying to support her family. She did not deserve to be murdered because her husband wanted a new life with his mistress.

That mistress, Nichol Kessinger, walked away. She cooperated with investigators and has largely disappeared from public view. So now Watts has found another woman willing to fill that role, someone who apparently sees no issue with marrying a man who murdered his own children.

Whatever her reasons for pursuing the relationship, she is making a voluntary decision to marry a man convicted of murdering his pregnant wife and children. Therefore, she is not a victim. She is a willing participant in the continued romanticisation of a monster. And the fact that this is even permitted, that a man who murdered his entire family is allowed to marry, is a failure of the justice system.