US man jailed for 18 years over Bali 'suitcase murder'

A US man was jailed for 18 years on Tuesday for brutally murdering his pregnant girlfriend's mother and stuffing her body into a suitcase outside a luxury hotel on the Indonesian resort island of Bali.

Judges found Tommy Schaefer, 21, guilty and handed him the jail term for the murder of Sheila von Wiese Mack in August last year.

The Bali court was to hand down the verdict for his girlfriend and the victim's daughter, 19-year-old Heather Mack, later Tuesday.

Presiding judge Made Suweda said that Schaefer had been found "legally and convincingly guilty of committing a premeditated murder".

The jail term was the same as that recommended by prosecutors. The 21-year-old escaped a death sentence, the maximum term for premeditated murder in Indonesia.

Von Wiese Mack's badly beaten body was discovered in a taxi outside an upmarket resort on Bali. After her killing the couple, from the Chicago area, fled to another part of Bali where police arrested them.

Schaefer confessed to the killing during his trial but claimed he was defending himself during a blazing row with von Wiese Mack, who was unhappy that her daughter was pregnant.

Prosecutors have called for a 15-year jail term for the daughter, who gave birth to a baby girl last month. She is also accused of premeditated murder, and could be handed the death penalty as judges are not obliged to follow sentence recommendations.

She maintains her innocence, and her indictment says she hid in the bathroom during the killing.