PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — More than two years after a teenager’s decomposing body was found in a South Philadelphia basement, a woman has admitted to handing her a fatal dose of drugs and hiding her body.
In a negotiated plea deal, Maddison Leidy admitted to knowingly giving 18-year-old Erin Schweikert fentanyl and wrapping the teen’s body in a plastic tarp. She said she gave her the drug after getting into an argument with her. And she admitted to wrapping the body in a tarp, and keeping her in a plastic box in her basement for months.
The 27-year-old pleaded guilty to drug delivery resulting in death, abuse of corpse and related offenses. Prosecutors say Leidy also slept next to the body for months before detectives got a tip about the decomposing remains in her basement on Porter Street. Detectives found her body in January of 2020.
Schweikert’s mother wrote a letter to the court, calling her daughter “a beautiful person” who was loved, loyal and a “spitfire” — born premature, fighting to survive, only to die at 18. She added, “everyone needs an Erin in their life.”
Leidy waived her pre-sentence investigation.
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Leidy told the judge she struggled with addiction and was selfish, adding that she “would never hurt anyone on purpose.” She apologized to the teen’s family — saying that she is now sober, thinking clearly and trying to be a better person and mother to her young son — before being sentenced to 10 to 20 years in prison, with an additional 2 1/2 to 5 years for violating probation on a previous robbery case.
Judge Scott O’Keefe called the crime “senseless and stupid” and told the family he could not imagine the pain and suffering of losing someone so young, for no reason.
Leidy will be eligible for parole in 2040, but the victim’s family says they will fight it each time.