by It’s been ten years since two girls lured their classmates into the woods in a quiet Wisconsin suburb almost to their death. It was all in the name of the fictional character Slender Man, they claimed.
Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier were 12 years old when they attacked sixth-grader Payton Leutner at a Waukesha park on May 31, 2014 after the three friends were supposed to pass out.
Miss Leutner was stabbed 19 times and left for dead, but she survived the horrific attack that made headlines around the world.
Geyser and Weier told investigators they raped Ms. Leutner to earn the right to be Slender Man’s servants and protect their families from him. The tall, faceless creature in a suit is just a fictional character created online, but quickly became the boogeyman of children’s nightmares.
Geyser pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide in a deal with prosecutors and a judge sent her to a psychiatric institution for 40 years after deciding she was mentally ill.
Weier pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree intentional homicide and was also committed to a psychiatric facility after a jury found she was suffering from mental illness at the time of the attack. In 2021, Weier was granted conditional release to live with her father and ordered to wear a GPS monitor. A judge removed that condition on September 12, 2023.
This week, Geyser – now a 21-year-old woman – will be back in court to plead with Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Bohren to release her from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute.
She made a similar application for conditional release in 2022 but withdrew the petition two months after filing it.
In January she came via Zoom listening to ask for release. The next hearing was set for a two-day period this week. At the previous hearing her solicitor Anthony Cotton said: “She has made incredible progress and I think she is able to come home now.”
He added: “Morgan was somebody who was 11 years old, 12 years old when this first happened and she’s spent almost half her life in custody now.”
Here’s how the horrific events unfolded:
How a friendship turned almost fatal
Payton Leutner befriended Morgan Geyser in the fourth grade, at a time when she said Geyser was having trouble making friends, Ms. Leutner said in a 2019 interview with ABC’s David Muir.
“She was sitting all by herself and I didn’t think anyone should have to sit by themselves,” Ms Leutner said.
Ms Leutner described herself as optimistic and positive before the attack, and said she tried to see the good in people, including Geyser.
But everything “went downhill” when Geyser befriended Weier in sixth grade and started talking about Slender Man, she said.
She said it scared her a little, but she wanted to support her friend and his interests.
But as Geyser’s obsession with Slender Man grew, Miss Leutner considered ending their friendship.
“I saw the change from fifth to sixth grade when she met Anissa,” she said. “That’s when I really wanted out of that friendship.”
But they remained friends and she said she didn’t know what was coming when she arrived at Geyser’s house for her 12th birthday slumber party.
“When I look back on it, I was like, it’s very strange,” she said. “Why didn’t I see something? Why didn’t I notice that something was strange? But I’m not blaming myself at all. Because who could ever see something like this coming? No one could ever see something like this coming.”
The attack
The plan to kill Ms. Leutner was prompted by the girls’ desire to satisfy Slender Man.
According to a criminal complaint, the plan was originally supposed to be carried out on May 30, 2014, the night of Geyser’s sleepover to celebrate his 12th birthday.
But then they changed the plan and decided to kill her the next morning at a nearby park in Waukesha.
Once they were at the park, Weier suggested they go on a hike to play hide and seek in the nearby woods, she told investigators.
“They just wanted to go for a walk,” Ms Leutner later told ABC. “And I didn’t think much of it. It’s just a walk. It’s in Waukesha. What bad things happen in Waukesha, Wisconsin?”
But Weier told Leutner to lay down and with a kitchen knife that Geyser brought from her home, she began stabbing her repeatedly and Weier egged her on.
Miss Leutner suffered 19 stab wounds and barely survived, according to the medical staff who treated her.
The girls left Miss Leutner for dead but she went on a cycle path and was found by a passer-by.
Police arrested Geyser and Weier later that day while walking on Interstate 94 in Waukesha.
Who is the slim man?
Slender Man is a fictional supernatural character that originated as a “creepypasta” – or horror – internet meme created by Something Awful forum user Eric Knudsen in 2009 under the username “Victor Surge.”
The creation was part of a photoshop challenge where users were asked to manipulate real photos to give them a paranormal edge.
Slender Man is usually depicted as a spider-like figure in a black suit with a featureless white face and is seen as a sinister force and an avenging angel.
Geyser and Weier found Slender Man on the Creepypasta Wiki, apparently believed it to be real and decided to become a “proxy” for the character, proving their commitment to him and his existence to skeptics, according to the criminal complaints.
But to fully prove their commitment, the girls believed they had to kill someone. They decided that person was their friend Payton.
After the 2014 attack, Mr. Knudsen issued a statement to the media: “I am deeply saddened by the tragedy in Wisconsin and my heart goes out to the families of those affected by this terrible act.”
Payton Leutner’s stabbing scared parents across the country of a Slender Man.
Russell Jack, who was Waukesha’s police chief at the time, warned that the Slender Man should be “a wake-up call to all parents” that “the internet is full of dark and evil things”.
The test
Geyser pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide in a deal with prosecutors and a judge committed her to a psychiatric institution after determining she was mentally ill.
Geyser was diagnosed with early-onset schizophrenia after being taken into custody, according to Rolling Stone.
Weier pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree intentional homicide and was also committed to a psychiatric facility after a jury found she was suffering from mental illness at the time of the attack.
In December 2017, Weier received the maximum 25 years in a mental health facility after pleading guilty to being an accomplice to second-degree intentional homicide.
In February 2018, Geyser received 40 years in a mental hospital after pleading guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide.
In 2021, Weier was granted conditional release to live with her father and ordered to wear a GPS monitor.
Slim man and Hollywood
It was only a matter of time before Hollywood came wanting the gruesome figure after the attack gained international notoriety.
HBO documentary Avoid the Slim Man broadcast in 2017.
Sony Pictures followed suit with a 2018 film titled A thin man which showed the horror character.
Although not based on a real-life situation, Weier’s father, Bill Weier, said it was “absurd” and “extremely unpleasant” to call a tragedy.
The disturbing character was also the inspiration for an episode of both Supernatural and Law and Order.
Payton Leutner rebuilds her life
Ms. Leutner underwent 25 surgeries to repair her heart, liver, stomach and pancreas after the attack, her mother Stacie Leutner told ABC Action News in Tampa Bay, Florida.
But her emotional trauma was just as scarring, as she later revealed that she slept with scissors under her pillow for protection.
Miss Leutner never spoke publicly about what happened to her in the woods until 2019.
“I feel like it’s time for people to see my side instead of everyone else’s,” she said in an exclusive interview with ABC’s David Muir.
She was 17 when she finally told her story, explaining that she had worked hard over the past five years to heal and rebuild a normal life.
“I’ve come to accept all the scars I have,” Ms. Leutner said.
“It’s just a part of me. I don’t think much of them. They will probably go away and eventually go away.”
She has since graduated high school and had plans to pursue a career in the medical field. As of September 2021, she was a college sophomore and had a part-time job, according to TheAssociated Press.
“I never thought someone who went through what I did would ever say that,” she said, after deciding to focus on positive things. “But that’s how I really feel. Without the whole situation, I wouldn’t be who I am.”
