Morgan Geyser asked a judge to free her from a psychiatric hospital on Friday, some 10 years after she violently stabbed her classmate at the behest of internet horror legend “Slender Man.”
On May 31, 2014, Geyser and her friend Anissa Weier, both of them just 12 years old at the time, invited Payton Leutner over for a sleepover and lured her into some woods in Waukesha, Wisc. Geyser then repeatedly stabbed her classmate while Weier egged her on.
Both girls later confessed to carrying out the attack, during which Leutner suffered 19 stab wounds. They told authorities they hoped that killing their classmate would earn them the right to be servants for Slender Man.
The spooky character, often depicted as an unrealistically tall and thin figure without a face, emerged from internet message boards like Something Awful and Creepy Pasta and is notorious for stalking children.
Despite suffering 19 stab wounds, including one that narrowly missed her heart, Leutner survived the attack thanks to a passing bicyclist, who was able to get her medical help in time.
Geyser was sentenced to 40 years in a mental hospital in 2018 after pleading guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide.
Weier meanwhile pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree homicide and was ordered to spend 25 in a mental hospital. She was granted a release in 2021 to live with her father and was ordered to wear a GPS monitor.
In a one-page petition filed with Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Bohren, 22-year-old Geyser requested she too be freed from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute. It did not offer any arguments for her release. Instead, it cited state laws that require Bohren within 20 days to appoint at least one expert to examine Geyser and produce a report within 30 days of being appointed.
Bohren set a hearing for Nov. 1 to address the matter.
The filing marks the third time Geyser has asked Bohren to let her out of the facility in the last two years.
She withdrew her first petition two months after filing it in 2022. She tried again back in April, but Bohren rejected her request, concluding that she still posed a risk to herself and others.
He said he was also troubled by the fact that Geyser has changed her story in recent years, attributing the attack to her desire to escape her abusive father, who is now dead.
With News Wire Services