Illinois Woman Killed at Posh Bali Resort and Stuffed into a Suitcase

Caption: The suitcase in which Sheila von Weise-Mack’s body was found. | The trunk of the taxi at the St. Regis Hotel. | Tommy Schaffer, 21, is in custody.

A 62-year-old Chicago woman was beaten to death in a posh Bali resort hotel and stuffed into a suitcase this week — and now her teenage daughter and the daughter’s boyfriend are under arrest.

The body of Sheila von Weise-Mack — formerly a longtime resident of Oak Park who was well known in the local arts community — was found in a suitcase in the back of a taxi at the St. Regis Hotel in Depasar, Bali, in Indonesia, reports The Daily Mail.

The daughter, Heather Lois, 19, and a man, Tommy Schaefer, 21, were staying at the hotel and were later joined by Heather’s mother. Police said hotel cameras show von Weise-Mack arguing with Schaefer. The morning after the argument in the hotel lobby, the young couple checked out of the hotel and lugged the big suitcase to a taxi. Police said hotel employees told them the couple would not let anyone touch the suitcase.

The couple did not return to the taxi, which sat at the hotel for hours. The driver and hotel employees then opened the trunk and saw blood on the outside of the suitcase, after which the driver went to the police station. Authorities opened the suitcase and found the woman’s half-naked body, according to CNN.

“The body was wrapped in a hotel bedsheet and tied up with duct tape,” said Denpasar police chief Djoko Hari Utomo, according to The Daily Mail. “There were blood stains all over the sheet.”

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A medical examiner said von Weise-Mack was severely beaten.

“There were signs of a struggle by the victim, as there were bruises on her arms and some fingers were broken,” said Ida Bagus Putu Alit, per a report in the Chicago Tribune. Alit said she was hit on the face and head with a blunt object.

The daughter and the young man, Schaefer, were found sleeping at another hotel and taken into custody on suspicion of murder, according to CNN.

Under questioning, her daughter and boyfriend told police they had been taken captive by an armed gang but managed to escape, according to CNN. They said the gang killed Von Weise Mack.

Hotel employees and the taxi driver told a far different story, however.

On Thursday, Heather Mack and Tommy Schaefer underwent psychiatric tests, reports Reuters.

Von Weise-Mack lived in Oak Park for many years before she moved into the city after her husband died in 2006, according to NBC Chicago.

She was married to the conductor-composer James L. Mack.

“She has a lot of friends, a lot of people who knew her here, and I think this is going to be a real shock. Everybody was hoping that with the move and that, that her life would get better,” Oak Park resident and friend Allen Parchem told NBC Chicago.

“She was very much involved in the arts. So you would see her at concerts. You would see her at lectures. I knew that she had a very active arts life downtown,” he said. “With the move to downtown I think she was hoping to even be more a part of that scene.”

The Tribune reports that von Weise-Mack, who was born in Minneapolis, grew up in Grosse Pointe, MI, and gave birth to her daughter Heather at the age of 43, worked for Sen. Ted Kennedy after graduating from college in Boston, worked with famed Chicago author Studs Terkel and studied under author Saul Bellow. She worked for the book publisher Doubleday, where she was a colleague of Jacqueline Kennedy.

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