The Heather Schwab case ended in February 2025 when her boyfriend, Chad Christopher Stevens, pleaded guilty to tampering with a corpse and was sentenced to 30 years in a Texas state prison. Schwab, 35, had been dead for more than a year when McKinney police found her body wrapped in plastic inside a refrigerator at Stevens’ home in November 2023. Prosecutors never charged him with murder because the medical examiner could not determine how she died.
How Schwab’s Body Was Found
On November 12, 2023, McKinney police executed a search warrant at 601 Pearson Avenue, Stevens’ home, and discovered Schwab’s remains inside a kitchen refrigerator. The body was wrapped in large amounts of plastic wrap, and the kitchen itself had been sealed off from the rest of the house with a piece of sheetrock.1NBC News. Missing Texas Woman’s Remains Found in Boyfriend’s Refrigerator Investigators believed she had been dead for well over a year.
Schwab’s mother, Tammra Schwab, had filed a missing person report with the McKinney Police Department on July 28, 2023. She told officers her daughter was in an abusive relationship with Stevens, 42, and had told family she feared he would kill her and hide her body.1NBC News. Missing Texas Woman’s Remains Found in Boyfriend’s Refrigerator When police first interviewed Stevens, he said Schwab had left him about a year earlier and he hadn’t heard from her since. Detectives said they had no leads until November 3, 2023.
The Phone Call That Broke the Case
On November 2, 2023, Stevens’ ex-wife and daughter, who live in Oklahoma, called him to share news that his daughter was expecting a baby. According to the arrest affidavit, Stevens threatened his daughter and her unborn child. His daughter then told him he “needed to watch what he says because she knew that his girlfriend had gone missing.”2Fox 4 News. Heather Schwab Chad Stevens Arrest Affidavit Stevens responded sarcastically, “Oh, so you think I killed her?” He then asked how she knew his backyard had been dug up, a detail she had not mentioned.
Stevens’ ex-wife contacted Tammra Schwab after the call and told her Stevens had killed Heather and buried her in the backyard. Tammra relayed the information to McKinney police, who obtained a search warrant on November 6, 2023. Before entering, officers surveyed the backyard with drones and identified what they called “several anomalies.”2Fox 4 News. Heather Schwab Chad Stevens Arrest Affidavit The ex-wife and daughter also told investigators that Stevens had researched the penalty for hiding a body and said he believed he would only get five years in prison.
Stevens was initially taken into custody on an unrelated assault warrant tied to a different ex-girlfriend. After officers broke through the sheetrock partition and found Schwab’s body, Stevens admitted she had died in the home and said he put her in the refrigerator because he “didn’t know what to do with it.”1NBC News. Missing Texas Woman’s Remains Found in Boyfriend’s Refrigerator
Shifting Stories About How Schwab Died
Stevens gave investigators several different accounts. He first said Schwab had left him. He told neighbors she had died of cancer.3Fox 4 News. McKinney Chad Stevens Heather Schwab Sentence After police found the body, he said she died on July 26, 2022, after slipping in the shower and hitting her head. Detectives identified a separate police call to the home on August 17, 2022, involving a man screaming and a woman waving a firearm, and noted that August “could be a more accurate time frame of the incident.”1NBC News. Missing Texas Woman’s Remains Found in Boyfriend’s Refrigerator
Tammra Schwab told police her daughter had lived with Stevens for several years in a volatile, abusive relationship. Stevens himself admitted to police that he had been in “multiple physical altercations” with Schwab and had threatened to kill her on several occasions. Neighbors who regularly saw the couple described Stevens as “paranoid.”2Fox 4 News. Heather Schwab Chad Stevens Arrest Affidavit A separate arrest affidavit showed that another woman moved in with Stevens in September 2022, just weeks after Schwab is believed to have died. On January 1, 2023, when that woman tried to leave, Stevens allegedly locked the door and threw her into a chair.
Why Stevens Was Not Charged With Murder
The Collin County medical examiner could not determine Schwab’s cause of death because her body had been concealed for more than a year.3Fox 4 News. McKinney Chad Stevens Heather Schwab Sentence Without a cause of death, prosecutors did not pursue a murder charge.4NBC DFW. Family Gets Justice in Death of Young Mother Stevens was charged instead with tampering with evidence with intent to impair a human corpse, a Texas felony that carried substantial prison time on its own.
The Guilty Plea and 30-Year Sentence
On February 11, 2025, Stevens pleaded guilty in a Collin County courtroom and was sentenced to 30 years in state prison.3Fox 4 News. McKinney Chad Stevens Heather Schwab Sentence About 40 of Schwab’s supporters attended, many wearing purple and butterfly pins because Schwab had loved butterflies.4NBC DFW. Family Gets Justice in Death of Young Mother
Tammra Schwab addressed Stevens from the courtroom. “You are evil. Evil and soulless,” she said. “Your worthless life has not served a single purpose. Your life has only brought fear, pain and destruction.” She said Stevens had taken her daughter down “a long, dark road that included mental, emotional, psychological and physical abuse.”3Fox 4 News. McKinney Chad Stevens Heather Schwab Sentence
Schwab’s sister, Haley Jo, told the court Stevens had “torn Heather down” through financial abuse, control, and manipulation. “He took Heather from us long before he hurt her,” she said.4NBC DFW. Family Gets Justice in Death of Young Mother Haley Jo later began volunteering with Genesis Women’s Shelter and Support in Dallas.
Schwab’s Own Criminal History
Separate from her death, Heather Schwab had drawn public attention for her own criminal record. Prosecutors described her and her husband, William Schwab, as “serial squatters” who rented residential properties under false identities and refused to pay rent until they were formally evicted. Their offenses dated back to 1996 across Colorado and Texas, where the couple had been evicted more than 20 times.5CBS News Colorado. Heather Schwab Serial Squatter Prison
In 2018, Heather signed an 18-month lease for a home in Thornton, Colorado and provided two checks totaling $4,400 that bounced.6Denver Post. Adams County Serial Squatter Sentenced On September 18, 2018, she pleaded guilty to felony identity theft and was sentenced to six years in prison by Adams County District Court Judge Byron Howell, who called her conduct “appalling.”5CBS News Colorado. Heather Schwab Serial Squatter Prison She served roughly 16 months and was released in 2020.7New York Post. Serial Squatter Heather Schwab May Have Schemed Her Last Illegal Stay
In October 2023, the Rowlett Police Department issued a felony warrant for her arrest on a fraudulent securing of document execution charge, valued between $30,000 and $150,000, after she rented a home in that Dallas suburb under a false name and never paid.8CBS News Texas. Wanted Serial Squatter Charged With Felony Fraud in Rowlett Police believed she was still in Texas and asked the public for tips. They did not know she was already dead. Her body was found at Stevens’ home weeks later.