news

A woman's body found in a suitcase. Her 19-year-old daughter has been arrested.

 

Sheila Von Weise-Mack with her daughter Heather Mack

 

 

 

 

Warning: This post deals with graphic violence and an allegation of a sexual assault and may be distressing for some readers.

Update:

Further details have emerged regarding Sheila von Wiese-Mack, the mother allegedly killed and hidden in a suitcase by her daughter, 19-year-old Heather Mack.

The Daily Mail reports Ms von Wiese-Mack was paid $800,000 in a lawsuit settlement against a cruise liner company three years ago — and court documents show that around $500,000 was designated for her daughter after going to her husband’s estate.

James Mack, who died in 2006, signed his will five days before his death, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. The will specified it was “only to provide for Heather Mack, my child, and for no other children.”

But in 2011, a court ruled Ms von Weise-Mack could pay herself that $500,000 as the estate’s ‘sole beneficiary’, The Daily Mail reports.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports it is not clear if the settlement affected hte relationship between mother and daughter.

Update:

Heather Mack, the teenager accused of murdering her mother in Bali and storing the woman’s head in a suitcase, had reportedly been abusing her mother for years.

ADVERTISEMENT

Police reports reveal Ms Mack was accused of locking her mother Sheila von Wiese-Mack in a closet, punching and biting her, and once breaking her arm by pushing her to the ground, the Chicago Tribune reports.

According to NBC Chicago, Oak Park police responded to the family home 86 times between 2004 and 2013.

After one 2010 incident, records show Oak Park police recommended Mack be admitted to a mental health facility after she punched her mother’s broken ankle.

Her mother refused and the family agreed to try to get along.

In another incident in 2012, police were called after Ms Mack reportedly bit her mother on the wrist. Ms von Wiese-Mack chose not to press charges — telling a police officer that she didn’t think jailing her would help, the Chicago Tribune reports.

Previously, Mamamia wrote…

By SHAUNA ANDERSON

She is accused of murdering her own mother — but if media reports are to be believed, her biggest concern is over what type of fast food she receives while being held in prison.

Heather Mack, 19, sits in a Bali jail cell as police investigate the murder of her 62-year old mother.

Last Wednesday, the dismembered body of her mother was found in a suitcase in the boot of a taxi in the driveway of a five-star resort  in Bali.

ADVERTISEMENT

Heather Mack, her 21-year old boyfriend Tommy Schaefer and her mother, Sheila Von Weise-Mack, were holidaying at the $500 a night St. Regis Bali Resort.

According to NBC, police allege that a week ago Ms Mack and her boyfriend Tommy Schaefer  – a self-described ‘rap artist’ – hired a taxi and placed a suitcase inside the car’s boot.

They allegedly told the taxi driver that they were going to check out of the hotel and would return.

After two hours when Ms Mack and Mr Schaefer had not reappeared,  hotel security guards investigated – and found blood spots on the suitcase.

The driver took the suitcase to police who found the body of Ms Von Weise-Mack inside. She appeared to have been bashed with a vase or ashtray, her bloodied body shoved into the case.

Police say the couple then used the dead woman’s credit card to pay for their room at another hotel where they fled. They were arrested at the Kuta hotel, according to News Limited.

The teenager, from Chicago, claims she is innocent – saying that three men wearing masks burst into her mother’s room at the resort and attacked her.

Heather Mack and Tommy

The Sun Times reports that on the day of the alleged murder, the mother and daughter had publicly argued over who would pay the hotel bill. Her mother allegedly told Ms Mack she had paid for flights and that Ms Mack and Mr Shaefer should pay the bill.

ADVERTISEMENT

Just days ago the case became even more convoluted with a startling revelation that Ms Mack is pregnant.

Fairfax Media reports that the pregnancy is, however, not ectopic as she told police.

As Ms Mack and her boyfriend await formal charges, she now claims that she has been sexually assaulted several times in her jail cell. The Daily Mail reports that she is unsure whether it was prison guards or fellow prisoners who committed the assault.

News Limited reports Ms Mack has also been making accusations of racism, saying she had been given KFC to eat because they had assumed she would like fried chicken.

“Police sources said the couple had been given KFC chicken to eat and this had angered Mack’s boyfriend Tommy Schaefer, 21, who told police it was insulting as he has black skin and KFC is for the lower echelons of society. Police were taken aback at this allegation, claiming that in Bali KFC is expensive for the average income earner and not at all for the lower wage earners.”

That situation seems to be resolved, with The Daily Mail saying that yesterday she was given McDonalds to eat.

There have been widespread reports about how the troubled teenager – the daughter of acclaimed jazz and classical musician and composer James L Mack – was in and out of psychiatric care.

The Sun Times saying police officers had been called to their home 86 times between January 2004 and June 2013, most of them relating to domestic violence and missing persons incidents.

Mack has been arrested and awaits formal charges

The body of Ms Mack’s mother will now be flown to the US for forensic analysis while the teenager stays behind in Bali. If charged with pre-meditated murder, she may face the death penalty.
[post_snippet id=324408]