DA Rourke answered some questions after the presser. I’ve transcribed most of the questions together with his responses. Some of the questions were difficult to hear.
‘Sandi said very, very poignantly to me. She said that, “He made the choice to take those lives. I do not want to be in a position of making a choice to take his”.’
Q. Chris Watts first said Shan’ann actually killed the two little girls. What was his story when he changed his mind and were they killed before Shan’ann got home?
A. I don’t know the answer to that question. We talked a lot about whether we would require him to come forward and give us what we believed to be a complete, accurate and truthful statement. I think all of those who were involved never truly believed that he would give us an accurate statement. What I can tell you most affirmatively today by what happened in the courtroom is the spotlight that he tried to shine on Shan’ann falsely, incorrectly, and frankly a flat out lie, has been corrected. The spotlight shines directly where it belongs, on him.
Q. What’s the status of the autopsy reports?
A. Those are still sealed at this point. I need to have a conversation with the Coroner’s office, with Shan’ann’s family and the County Attorney representing the Coroner’s office about what point in time those will become a public record. We are not assuming that the sentencing hearing goes the way that we believe that it will and goes forward. We will not be asking that those be kept sealed any longer after the sentencing hearing.
Q. Was it just a matter of the death penalty to get the guilty pleas?
A. You’d have to ask them. All I can tell you is the discussions we had with them, and frankly the discussions that Mr Wren (? sp.) we had with the Rzucek family, made it very clear that there was not gonna be no further concession. I didn’t feel like this was a case where it was appropriate to agree to dismiss some counts in exchange for a plea of guilty to others because we charged him with what we truly believed he’d done at the time we filed that complaint, and I was not willing to entertain any further concessions above and beyond removing the death penalty from consideration.
Q. During your investigation, did you ever get a motive from Chris Watts?
A. Ask me again in two and a half weeks or – the day after the day of sentencing I’ll be happy to answer that question. At this point that’s getting a little bit too far into the investigation at least as we sit right now. We believe that we have a partial motive. I’m not sure if it’s the entirety of the motive but I’ll be happy to comment on that after the sentencing hearing.
Q. Will Chris Watts be in solitary confinement?
A. I don’t know. I don’t know the answer to that. Whether or not he’s in solitary confinement, where he serves his time, whether it be – in what DOC facility in the State of Colorado or if he’s one who’s transferred to another state is left to the discretion of the Executive Director of the Department of Corrections.
… He deserves a life sentence for each and every act on top of one another. In practicality, it doesn’t make a difference in terms of how long he’s ultimately gonna serve, but what he needs to understand is he will be serving 3 consecutive life sentences plus a sentence for Nico because of the acts that he committed against all four of them. It is important that each of those beautiful human beings be reflected in the ultimate sentence that will be imposed.
Q. Have you ever had a case like this resolved so soon into the investigation?
A. No.
DA speaks following Chris Watts guilty plea
