Heather Mack and Tommy Schaefer (Instagram photo)

Former Oak Park resident Heather Mack, who is serving a 26-year sentence in a West Virginia federal prison for conspiring to kill her mother in Bali in 2014, has formally complained to a federal judge that prison officials are trying to force her to make unreasonably high monthly payments on court-ordered financial restitution.

A closer look suggests that that’s not nearly all there is to the story.

At Mack’s sentencing in January 2024, Judge Matthew Kennelly ordered her to pay $262,708 in restitution to a trust fund set up to benefit her daughter Stella, who is being raised by a relative.

Kennelly called that sum “a reasonable” estimate of Sheila Mack’s income from Social Security had she reached an average life span. Kennelly said the restitution, a fine of $50,000 and $100 in court costs were “due immediately,” although the manner and frequency of the restitution payments was not set by the court.

At issue is Mack’s participation in what is called the Inmate Financial Responsibility Program. In a court filing Dec. 19, Mack’s defense attorney, Michael Leonard, alleged that officials at the Hazelton correctional facility in West Virginia, are punishing Mack for failing to pay a certain amount every month in restitution.

Prison officials, Leonard told the judge, have “taken the position that, if Ms. Mack fails to pay at least $440 or $490 or more per month, then she will be put in the ‘hole.’”

Leonard asked the judge for an order “setting (or) reducing” Mack’s monthly restitution obligation, and that the order “mak(e) it clear to the BOP (Bureau of Prisons) that no such per month restitution obligation exists, and/or an Order clarifying what Ms. Mack’s monthly restitution obligation is, if any.”

The judgment, Leonard said with emphasis, “does not include a condition requiring her to pay a sum in excess of $400.00 per month, or any particular amount.”

Government lawyers say Mack’s motion grossly mischaracterizes her circumstances at the prison. They insist that sentencing judges have no say on the manner in which any fines and restitution they order to be paid are executed.

Assistant U.S. Attorney D. Heffron said in the government’s reply to the defense motion that Mack misunderstood both the prison regulations and the trial court’s authority regarding the process of collecting any money due from her.

Heffron said that Mack had, “agreed to an Inmate Financial Responsibility Program plan that required a monthly (payment) of $440.”

“It appears that defense counsel was under the mistaken impression that Mack was actually put in the ‘hole’ or Special Housing Unit,” Heffron wrote. “However, it appears that it was only Mack’s (mis)understanding that she would be put in the SHU if she did not make monthly payments.”

Placement in the Special Housing Unit, or “hole,” Heffron said, “is not a consequence of failing to participate or to meet the IFRP’s requirements.”

Mack’s purported erroneous characterization of her treatment and circumstances aside, Heffron argued that there is established legal precedent that “a district court should not specify a payment schedule during the term of incarceration and that the BOP is statutorily entitled to enforce the judgment of the court.”

The Bureau of Prisons, Heffron argued, “is tasked with enforcing (Mack’s) restitution order against her prison wages and inmate trust account through the Inmate Financial Responsibility Program while she is incarcerated.”

He said the Bureau of Prisons determined Mack’s monthly payment amount “through a formula relying on the total deposits into the defendant’s inmate trust account over the previous six months.”

The monthly IFRP payment, he said, “may fluctuate if deposits increase or decrease. During the course of her incarceration, Mack’s monthly deposits have decreased and thus, so has her obligation under the IFRP.”

Heffron noted that while Mack’s participation in the IFRP was voluntary, refusal to participate in the IFRP carries several negative consequences, including her being held ineligible “to receive a work assignment outside of the facility, limitations on her commissary spending, her being quartered in the lowest housing status, and not receiving an incentive for participation in residential drug treatment programs.”

Heffron argued that Judge Kennelly, “is not statutorily authorized … to order BOP to compromise those requirements for the benefit of a particular inmate.”

Mack, he said, “seeks to limit the U.S.’s enforcement of the debt while simultaneously eluding the negative consequences of refusing to participate in the IFRP.”

Kennelly scheduled a teleconference hearing, after briefs are filed, for 8:45 a.m. Jan. 28.

Whatever the resolution of Mack’s complaint, the $262,708 in restitution due is only growing over time.

“I’m not going to waive interest on it,” Kennelly said at Mack’s sentencing last January. “So it’s going to continue to accrue interest for however long.”