Indonesia frees, deports former Chicago suburbanite after prison sentence for Bali "suitcase murder"
Heather Mack (R) and Tommy Schaefer (L) of the US are escorted from the jail to a prisoner van at Kerobokan prison in Denpasar on Indonesia's resort island of Bali on February 26, 2015. (SONNY TUMBELAKA/AFP via Getty Images)
JAKARTA, Indonesia - Indonesia freed and deported an American man Tuesday after he spent 11 years in prison for the premeditated murder of his then-girlfriend's mother on the tourist island of Bali.
What we know:
Tommy Schaefer was sentenced to 18 years in prison for the 2014 murder of Sheila von Wiese-Mack, the mother of Heather Mack, during a luxury vacation in a case also known as the Bali "suitcase murder."
Schaefer was deported back to the United States from Bali International Airport on Tuesday evening, after serving his sentence and receiving a number of remissions for good behavior, said Felucia Sengky Ratna, head of the Bali Regional Office of the Directorate General of Immigration, in a statement.
The badly battered body of the 62-year-old von Wiese-Mack, a wealthy Chicago socialite, was found inside the trunk of a taxi parked at the upscale St. Regis Bali Resort in August 2014.
Heather Mack, who was almost 19 and a few weeks pregnant at the time of the killing, and her then-21-year-old boyfriend, Schaefer, were arrested on the island a day after the body was found.
Schaefer previously lived in Oak Park, Illinois.
The video below is from previous Fox Chicago coverage
Heather Mack sentenced to 26 years in prison
Heather Mack, who was convicted of helping kill her mother during a luxury vacation at a Bali resort nearly a decade ago, was sentenced to 26 years in federal prison.
Mack served seven years of a 10-year prison sentence in Bali for helping to kill her mother and was deported in October 2021.
She was also sentenced to 26 years in prison in Chicago in January 2024, after she pleaded guilty to helping kill her mother and stuffing the body in a suitcase during their vacation.
The Source: This report was written by The Associated Press.