‘Suitcase killer’ Heather Mack sentenced to 26 years for mother’s Bali murder: Updates
Mack, now 28, appeared in federal court in Illinois, where she was given a 26-year prison sentence for the Bali murder of Sheila von Wiese-Mack
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“Suitcase killer” Heather Mack was back in court in Illinois on Wednesday to be sentenced over the 2014 murder of her mother at a luxury Bali resort.
Mack, 28, was sentenced to 26 years in prison.
In the courtroom, she was confronted by her family members who told the judge she should not be granted any leniency over Sheila von Wiese-Mack’s murder.
Prosecutors sought a 28-year sentence while Mack’s attorneys are asking for 15 years with credit for seven years spent in an Indonesian prison.
The tragic case began in August 2014 when Illinois socialite von Wiese-Mack, 62, took her then-18-year-old pregnant daughter on vacation to the St. Regis resort.
Mack’s boyfriend Tommy Schaefer, 21, flew out to the island and the pair bludgeoned von Wiese-Mack to death, stuffed her body in a suitcase and left it in the trunk of a taxi.
Both Mack and Schaefer were convicted of murder in Indonesia in 2015.
Mack served 7 years in prison before being deported and arrested as soon as she stepped foot on US soil.
After two years in federal prison awaiting trial, Mack reached a plea deal in June, pleading guilty to conspiracy to kill a US national.
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Heather Mack’s mother told police she feared her daughter would kill her. They were powerless to prevent it
‘Suitcase killer’ Heather Mack is sentenced to 26 years in US prison for Bali murder
What was Heather Mack’s sentence?
The 28-year-old was sentenced to 26 years behind bars. Mack was also ordered to pay more than $260,000 in restitution to her mother’s estate, with an additional fine of $50,000.
Mack’s lengthy prison sentence now brings some sort of conclusion to the case that tore a family apart, shocked America and spanned two nations for the best part of eight years.
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‘Suitcase killer’ Heather Mack is sentenced to 26 years in US prison for Bali murder
Mack was 18 when she conspired with her boyfriend Tommy Schaefer to murder her socialite mother Sheila von Wiese-Mack at the luxury five-star St Regis resort in Bali in 2014
Who is Tommy Schaefer?
Tommy Schaefer was Mack’s boyfriend at the time of the murder.
He was 21 at the time of the murder and Mack was 18 — and pregnant with his child.
Mack’s mother, socialite Sheila von Wiese-Mack invited the young couple on her luxury vacation. Mack used her mother’s credit card to buy a $12,000 business-class ticket for Schaefer to join them and a single night’s stay at the hotel.
In the early hours of the morning on 12 August 2014 – hours after Schaefer arrived – Mack, von Wiese-Mack and Schaefer were captured on hotel surveillance footage arguing in the lobby of the hotel. Sometime after that, Schaefer bludgeoned von Wiese-Mack to death with the metal handle of a fruit stand.
Schaefer and Mack then stuffed her body into a suitcase and wheeled it down into the hotel lobby.
They hailed a taxi, loaded the suitcase into the trunk of the car and tried to check out of the luxury resort.
He is still in prison in Bali.
WATCH; Who is the woman who pleaded guilty to her mother’s murder in Bali?
The Bali convictions
Following the murder, Heather Mack and Tommy Schaefer were arrested in Bali.
In custody, their stories changed several times.
Initially, they allegedly told Indonesian investigators that Sheila von Wiese-Mack was killed by robbers.
Then, Indonesian police said Schaefer confessed to murdering von Wiese-Mack and Mack confessed to helping shove her mother’s body in the suitcase – before Mack later denied the allegations.
Schaefer later testified at trial that he killed the 62-year-old because she attacked him when she found out her daughter was pregnant. Meanwhile, Mack was allegedly motivated by a desire to be free from her controlling mother.
Mack and Schaefer were both charged with premeditated murder and faced the death penalty by firing squad.
While Schaefer ultimately pleaded guilty, Mack did not.
Read the full story...
The chilling case of Heather Mack
As Chicago woman Heather Mack is facing sentencing for the murder of her socialite mother Sheila von Weise-Mack at a 5-star Bali resort in 2014, America remains horrified by the case involving a Bonnie and Clyde fantasy, a body stuffed in a suitcase and a baby born behind bars. Rachel Sharp reports
ICYMI: What happened to Sheila von Wiese-Mack?
It was August 2014 when wealthy socialite Sheila von Wiese-Mack took her troubled 18-year-old daughter Heather Mack on vacation to the 5-star St. Regis hotel in Bali.
After they arrived at the luxury resort, Mack used her mother’s credit card to buy a $12,000 business-class ticket for Schaefer to join them and a single night’s stay at the hotel.
In the early hours of the morning on 12 August 2014 – hours after Schaefer arrived – Mack, von Wiese-Mack and Schaefer were captured on hotel surveillance footage arguing in the lobby of the hotel.
Sometime after that, Schaefer bludgeoned von Wiese-Mack to death with the metal handle of a fruit stand.
Schaefer and Mack then stuffed her body into a suitcase and wheeled it down into the hotel lobby.
They hailed a taxi, loaded the suitcase into the trunk of the car and tried to check out of the luxury resort.
But, because von Weise-Mack had told the hotel not to let her daughter use her credit card, they were prevented from doing so and fled the scene.
The taxi driver – suspicious of the bloodied suitcase wrapped in hotel sheets – called the police who made the grim discovery of what was inside.
The couple was soon tracked down to a budget motel and arrested on suspicion of murder.
A harrowing history of violence
In the years leading up to the murder, police records reveal that officers responded to a string of violent incidents committed by Mack against her mother at their home in Illinois.
Oak Park Police records show at least 35 interactions with officers since 2008 including reports of Mack breaking her mother’s arm, biting her and punching her. The records also include reports of stealing credit cards and money – an apparent motive for the murder.
While only Mack now knows when the violence first began, the first record of police being called to the home came in April 2008 for a report that the then-13-year-old had locked her mother in a room and threatened her.
The next police report came in January 2010 when Mack allegedly punched her mother’s broken ankle.
Sgt Freelain first met von Wiese-Mack in November of that year when she reported that her daughter had stolen her credit card and $1,060 cash.
A detective specialising in youth and family issues at the time, he was assigned the case and says he met von Wiese-Mack in person and spoke with her on the phone several times. It was also the first time he met Mack, then aged 15.
After interviewing her, Mack admitted that she stole her mother’s credit card but denied stealing the cash.
“In that first meeting, I certainly saw how Sheila was torn in terms of what to do about Heather,” Sgt Freelain recalls.
“She suspected and then knew that she had stolen from her but didn’t want to follow through on pressing charges against her daughter which is understandable but as things progressed that infliction would make things very difficult for us to be able to help Sheila.
“In that first meeting it was clear something was wrong – in terms of both the financial side of things but also her daughter’s behaviour.
“But it was the next time when I met Sheila in February 2011, that alarm bells really went off.”
Sgt Freelain says that von Wiese-Mack turned up at the police department that night with her right arm broken and in a cast.
In one violent incident that January, Mack had pushed her mother causing her to fall and break arm, according to a police report later filed.
“Her body language – she looked so beaten back,” Sgt Freelain says of that day in February 2011.
“In November, it was clear there was some kind of domestic dynamic that wasn’t good but Sheila hadn’t been forthright in elaborating about what was going on.
“But that night I got her more comfortable talking and she opened up about the physical and verbal abuse. We established a good rapport that night that stayed over the next two-and-a-half years.”
Von Wiese-Mack told him what had happened to her arm.
“I told her ‘I’ve worked with families where the kids abuse the parents and it doesn’t fix itself’,” he says.
In photos: the Heather Mack case
A chilling Bonnie and Clyde plot
The couple referred to themselves as Bonnie and Clyde before the murder in text messages.
In the exchange, the couple plotted methods of murder and spoke about how “rich” they would be when Mack inherited her mother’s wealth after she was dead.
On the day that Mack and her mother von Wiese-Mack set off on their trip, Schaefer allegedly sent his girlfriend a text saying: “I can’t wait to be rich… Its crazy af Like Money Nothing rules the world.”
The next day, Mack replied telling him the “trips going as planned baby … faith”.
When Schaefer told her he had “a lot of faith” in her but “that a lot of things aren’t in her control”, Mack replied with chilling messages describing how she had been “watching” her “witch” mother.
Referring to herself as “bonnie” of Bonnie and Clyde, she urged her boyfriend not to “underestimate me”.
“I also know what is in my control … I know what makes people tick … the witch … I know what make [sic] her tick … I’m with her so much … I know her habbit [sic]… how she acts … what she does at certain times … its like breaking out of jail … It takes several years of watching … I have been watching her routine … and I know what I do control … Im sneaky … Im smart … and I watch … trust bonnie … Dn’t make everyone else mistake and under estimate me,” she wrote, per the court documents.