After 2 years in US custody, 'Suitcase Killer' Heather Mack is set to take a plea deal in her mother's murder

• Heather Mack, accused of killing her mother in 2014 in Bali, is set to take a plea deal in the murder case.

• She was deported to Chicago in 2021 after 7 years in a Bali prison - and was immediately arrested.

• Mack told Insider she's served her time and is ready to move on with her life.

It's an 11th-hour about-face for Heather Mack – the 27-year-old Chicago woman who brutally killed her mom during a luxury holiday in Bali.

Next week, as part of a plea bargain, Mack said she will accept guilt for her role in the slaying.

"I'm worried. I don't know what the government will do. I'm ready to get it (sentencing) over with. I'm worried about how the plea will go," Mack told Insider about her decision to take a plea bargain.

Mack became infamous after she was accused of killing her mother, Sheila Von Wiese Mack, with the help of her then-boyfriend Tommy Schaefer.

For the last 19 months, Mack has been remanded in Chicago's Metropolitan Correctional Center. Mack served seven years of a ten-year sentence in Indonesia and was arrested by the FBI when she landed at O'Hare airport in November 2021 after deportation.

Since Mack's return to the US, she has held out for a trial – represented by Chicago lawyer Michael Leonard – contending that she has already served her time.

"I just feel like no matter how mad they (the government) are at me, I feel like right is right and wrong is wrong, and I already did my time," Mack said.

Mack was indicted on three federal charges of conspiracy and obstruction in the US, while Schaefer is still in Indonesia serving a murder sentence.

Insider understands that part of the plea negotiation with Mack's attorney Jeff Steinbeck includes reducing the indictment to a single conspiracy charge. Contracting multiple charges to one, usually the most nominal offense, is standard practice for the Department of Justice.

"What would normally happen is that you plead guilty to a count and then the other counts will be dismissed as part of the process. The key here is that the penalty is up to life for two of the counts," Leonard said.

Such reductions of charges and, therefore, lighter sentencing represent the "bargain" for the accused in the plea bargain. In the Mack case, the Department of Justice would face the large cost of bringing nearly two dozen witnesses from Indonesia to Chicago for testimony if it pushed for a trial.

During her incarceration in Bali's harsh Kerobokan prison, Mack gave birth to baby Stella in 2015 and kept the infant behind bars with her for two years. After that a foster mother took Stella to settle with her family.

For good behavior, Mack's sentence was cut by three years. But even so has still spent the best part of a decade incarcerated since her initial arrest in 2014.

Mack hopes that even if the judge leans towards the maximum sentence for one charge, she will soon be free.

"So if they gave me 15 or even 18 years. I wouldn't even have that much more time because of time served," she told Insider. "In America, I do not have a criminal record, so the position of the government is understandable."

"A good thing about my plea is that the maximum supervised release used to be ten years, and now it's five years. If I did get the full five years of supervised release, I could be out in a year and a half or two years with good behavior," she said.

If convicted of a federal change, the law demands that felons serve 85% of their sentence.

"Bonnie and Clyde"

In August 2014, Mack was 18 and pregnant. She and Schaefer, 21, were arrested after the horrific killing of Sheila Von Wiese Mack, and the nation was transfixed.

Mack's mother was a beloved Chicago socialite, and her father was the celebrated musician, the late James L Mack.

Schaefer bludgeoned Sheila to death with a heavy fruit bowl, and the pair forced her body into a suitcase, the Indonesian trial heard.

Mack claimed the slaying was to free herself of her overbearing mother, while for Tommy, it was a murder for money — a slice of a $1.5 million inheritance.

Refusing offers of help from St. Regis hotel staff, the couple loaded the suitcase into the trunk of a taxi and attempted to check out of the prestige resort.

However, the previous day Sheila had told reception not to let Mack use her credit card, so when they could not check out, the couple fled the scene. The taxi driver sounded the alarm over the suspicious suitcase wrapped in hotel sheets in the trunk of his car. Following the terrible discovery, police found bloodied sheets and towels stashed in a fire-hydrant box outside of Sheila and Heather's room. Three bags packed with clothes belonging to the pair were also found discarded in the hotel gardens.

Schaefer and Mack — who called themselves Bonnie and Clyde after the murderous Depression-era robbers — used Tommy's passport to check into the budget Risata Hotel in Kuta after the murder.

The following morning, staff at the hotel recognized the couple from news reports and contacted police. The pair were arrested and charged with murder shortly after as surveillance footage showed Schaefer lurking outside of Sheila's room with a large item stuffed under his t-shirt. There was also footage of Heather and her mother arguing in the lobby hours before the murder took place.

Mack paid $12,200 for a business class flight to Bali for Schaefer, plus a single night at the St Regis using Sheila's credit card. Less than 12 hours after his arrival, Sheila was dead, and Schaefer was texting his cousin Ryan Bibbs about the millions of dollars they would get from Heather's inheritance.

In 2017, Ryan Bibbs was sentenced to nine years in prison for his involvement in the conspiracy to kill Sheila Von Wiese Mack by coaching Mack and Schaefer in murder methods.

During Mack and Schaefer's 2015 trial in Bali, she was found guilty of helping her boyfriend kill her mother.

Schaefer, then 21, entered a guilty plea for the murder of Sheila Von Wiese Mack. He claimed that Sheila attacked him after she learned her daughter was pregnant by him.

Mack is due to appear next week for her plea hearing in Chicago Federal Court.

Read the original article on Insider