A heiress who pleaded guilty to helping a former boyfriend kill her mother is scheduled to be sentenced today in Chicago, according to AP.
As CrimeOnline previously reported, federal prosecutors asked for Heather Mack to receive 28 years behind bars for the role she played in the murder of her mom, 62-year-old Sheila Von Wiese-Mack, at a luxury resort in Bali a decade ago.
Mack, now 28, pleaded guilty in June to conspiracy to kill a United States national in connection with the slaying. As part of the plea agreement, Mack confessed to plotting the 2014 murder with her then-boyfriend, Tommy Schaefer.
Mack used her mother’s credit card to book a flight for Schaefer to Bali, where he brutally beat Wiese-Mack with a fruit bowl. Schaefer and Mack then hid the victim’s body in a suitcase and attempted to discard it in a taxi before fleeing.
Mack’s lawyers want the judge to sentence her to 15 years, the legal minimum, with credit for 7 years already spent in an Indonesian prison. Defense attorneys argued a longer sentence “would clearly be a waste of public resources” and would harm Mack’s relationship with her young daughter, whom she birthed while behind bars in Indonesia, according to CBS News.
“For the taxpayers to incur the hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars to incarcerate Ms. Mack for an extended period of time within the BOP [U.S. Bureau of Prisons] is particularly unnecessary,” defense lawyer Michael Leonard said, court documents indicate.
The story is developing. Check back for updates.
For the latest true crime and justice news, subscribe to the ‘Crime Stories with Nancy Grace’ podcast.
[Feature Photo: Heather Mack, right, and her boyfriend Tommy Schaefer, both from Chicago, Ill., talk with their friends before their trial at the Denpasar District Court in Bali, Indonesia before their trial Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2015. They are accused of murdering the woman’s mother Sheila von-Wiese Mack, who was found stuffed inside a suitcase last August. (AP Photo/Firdia Lisnawati)]
Additional reporting by Jonathan Anderson
