The mother-daughter relationship between the Bali suitcase killing murder victim and accused suspect appears to have been tumultuous at best for months before that fateful day when American Sheila von Wiese-Mack’s bloody body was found stuffed into a suitcase at the Bali St. Regis.
Emails published by the Chicago Tribune and NBC Chicago reveal von Wiese-Mack’s tension with her teenage daughter and her struggles and complaints of her daughter’s violent outbursts.
After reading this one, published by the Chicago Tribune, we can’t help but feel things.
From: Sheila von Wiese
To: Heather Mack
Sent: Thursday, February 6, 2014 11:33 PM
Subject: Re:
Heather please. I am so sorry. Please let me pick you up and bring you home. I want to hug you and protect you. I will never abandon you. I am crying so hard now. I am so scared for both of us. I want to help you. You are not a failure. Please don’t think that. I know that you think I failed you, but I didn’t. I did all the wrong things, but all that matters is how much I love you… Please Please come home. Or tell me where you are and I will come to pick you up. Please Heather. I am sick with worry. I just want you home. No matter what. I promise you on Daddy’s grave
Some of the most powerful emails are from an exchange between von Wiese-Mack and her long-time trusted friend Elliot Jacobson.
From: “Sheila von Wiese”
To: “ELLIOTT”
Sent: Saturday, June 14, 2014 2:05:54 AM
Subject: Re:
Dear Elliott,
This past week has been terrible – resulting in bad chest pains for me again. This really is killing me and I feel so isolated and trapped as I live with Heather’s lies and manipulations ….
I will call you tomorrow. Heather is out again – she is almost never home at all any more and uses my home as a ‘crash pad’ to sleep and have me wash her clothes… I have an appointment with a psychiatrist for me next week – also for Heather with another psychiatrist to try to get her on some type of medication for her madness….
Love,
Sheila
One of the emails between Jacobson and von Wiese-Mack on August 1, 2014 shows that she already knew her teenage daughter was pregnant, just days before her body was found on August 12.
Mack, 19, and her boyfriend Tommy Schaefer, 21, are currently being tried separately for premeditated murder, which does carry the maximum penalty of death in Indonesia.
Schaefer testified last week that killed 60-year-old von Wiese-Mack in self defense after she allegedly threatened their unborn baby (who was delivered this week) and choked him. Mack to date, reportedly still maintains her innocence, claiming she hid in the bathroom when her mother was killed.
Photo by AFP
