A body language expert has analysed the 'deceptive body language' shown by Chris Watts in the interview filmed before he was arrested and charged for the murder of his wife and two daughters.
Watts is currently behind bars for five consecutive life sentences without possibility for parole for the 2018 murders of his wife, Shanann Watts, who was 15 weeks pregnant with their third child, and their daughters Bella Marie, four, and Celeste, three, in Colorado, US.
As revealed in letters to author Cheryln Cadle, he strangled Shanann to death in their home and left her in a grave near an oil-storage facility, and dumped his children's bodies into crude oil tanks after they'd died from suffocation.
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He pled guilty to nine charges including murder, tampering with deceased bodies and unlawful termination of a pregnancy (via the BBC).
A day after the three family members were reported missing, Watts gave an interview to Denver7’s Tomas Hoppough.
"Shanann, Bella, Celeste, if you’re out there, just come back, like if somebody has her, just please bring her back, I need to see everybody, I need to see everybody, again, this house is not complete without anybody here. Please bring them back." he pleaded in the interview.
Physiologist Dr G has since shared his analysis on the interview, revealing one 'disgusting' moment.
In a 2023 YouTube episode of Flashback Forensics, the expert pointed out how the criminal kept smiling throughout the video.
"What a disgusting smile, I mean, truly, he feels so relieved by people not being there, he really is starting to smile," he said. "And also him hiding his lips. That could also be recognising that he was smiling."
"That's what you have to do with body language, is there is some interpretation involved?
"So it's either one, don't smile again or two, he's getting ready to ask hard questions, don't say anything stupid, and now he's outright laughing."
Dr G said it was 'remarkable how pleased he looks by this and so it's almost like, as he talks about all of the obligations he has to family, and thinking about he won't have those anymore, the more pleased and the more happy he gets'.
"Maybe he wanted peace and quiet, maybe he didn't like having a family, there's so many possibilities but, clearly, he looks relieved, he looks happy," he said.
"Sometimes people smile when they are uncomfortable, not situations like this though.
"I'm talking about somebody might smile when they are having to give somebody bad news, or an awkward situation happens at work, or somebody says something that they don't know how to react to.
"Not that their family is missing. So this is an inappropriate smile, no matter how you cut it, this is not normal in any situation like this."
Watt's crimes were documented in Netflix's American Murder: The Family Next Door.
Anish Vij