Groupies of serial killers: Why do women send love letters to Christopher Watts?

"Greetings from New York, Chris!", Wrote to a Brooklyn-based woman at Christopher Watts on August 23, a few days after confessing to murdering his pregnant wife and daughters, charging the corpses in his truck and depositing them on an oil rig.

"I often thought about you a lot," Tatiana confessed to the now convicted killer: "I thought life was too short to hold back … so here I am! "

The 29-year-old woman locked a picture of herself in a bikini on a beach. "So you can put a face on the words. I know what you look like, so I thought it was right, she flirted. "I hope to have a smile on your face."

But if Tatiana failed, many other people were also trying to cheer him up.

Watts was charged on August 20 with several counts of murder. charge of first degree murder, illegal termination of pregnancy and alteration of a deceased human body.It pleaded guilty.In November, a Colorado judge sentenced him to three consecutive terms of imprisonment. life imprisonment – one for each victim of a murder.

At his time behind bars, documents obtained from the prosecutor's office by the Washington Post show those of Tatiana. was there one of the many letters he had received from suitors and fervent fans. *

Candace, mother of two and aged 39, wrote several times, her second letter was ending by #TEAMCHRIS #LOVEHIM and a scribbled heart "I've watched your interview and I've just become attracted to you (do not ask me why)," she said in a missive, adding that while he responded, she would be "the happiest girl in the world "

Another woman named Christan began by" addressing the elephant in the room. No, I am neither a creeper nor a madwoman. "She was attracted to Watts when she watched him take a deep breath as the judge read his murder charges.

She said, "I know how alienating this process can be. "

Tammy, 36, is described as" a mere girl living in a small town "and included photos. She noted that it was the first time she was writing to an inmate and that she was "really very nervous."

The Ohio-based woman asked Watts, "Why is a person as pretty as me single? And write to someone in prison? (She just came out of a serious breakup, she explained.)

[He said he killed his wife after she strangled their daughters. Prosecutors say he killed them all.]

How a woman can crack for a man imprisoned for killing his family may seem puzzled, but this phenomenon old to several decades is far from unusual. Offenders in the news – like Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, Charles Manson and the Menendez brothers – have also been pursued behind bars by countless women.

It is likely that the incarcerated person is part of the sadomasochistic fantasy of many of these women. Katherine Pier, a psychiatrist at the University of California at San Francisco, told The Washington Post that real crime shows are popular and accessible, but it's a way of flirting with the danger of nothing ", said Pier, who worked with criminals. "Women who write killers are often abused and gravitate around the attackers. Sitting with a man behind bars puts them in control positions. These women will probably never have the chance to meet the man they are pursuing. And if they did, they would be protected by the penitentiary system. "

Sheila Isenberg, author of" Women Who Love Men Who Kill, "echoed Pier.

It was less about chasing a celebrity or being with a notorious man. killer, says Isenberg, being in love with a man behind bars is exciting, "you do not know what's going to happen, there's always a rush of adrenaline."

[He killed his wife and daughters ‘for a fresh start,’ a prosecutor said. He’ll spend the rest of his life in prison.]

Then came a second kind of woman who competed to attract the attention of Christopher Watts.

Isenberg attributed this change to the current culture of celebrity worship and the rise of social media platforms, which have "allowed an explosion of female fans."

In part, women who write to killers like Watts want to be famous and known too.It's more a case of "Hey, I want to be famous, choose me."

In the past, real crime narratives making national headlines were mainly for murderers.The groupies of serial killers now have open communication forums.They generate Facebook groups and Reddit posts, warning men who would otherwise have been unknown killers, varied gardeners

The more famous the person, the more magnetic he is.

"That makes domestic assassins like public figures of Watts become notorious," said Isenberg, w he is currently working on a follow-up book titled "More women who love men who kill".

"Media frenzy and online attention around people like Watts have made me realize that there is a whole new kind of relationship between murderers and women. on the outside.

Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that Watts had been in prison for six months. He has been incarcerated for more than four months since his arrest in August.

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