A judge denied a motion to stop the release of a Wisconsin woman from a mental health facility more than a decade after she conspired to stab a classmate to please the fictional horror character “Slender Man.”
Morgan Geyser, 22, was 12 years old when she and Anissa Weier lured classmate Payton Leutner to a park for the violent attack in May 2014, convinced it would keep the fictional boogeyman from harming their families. She has spent seven years at the Winnebago Mental Health Institute and was cleared for release into a group home earlier this year.
Three medical experts testified in January that Geyser was no longer a threat to the public following considerable progress. Her treatment would continue while she was under supervision of the group home.
Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Bohren ruled that Geyser’s release would continue as planned.
Bohren said that under the conditional release, Geyser will still be placed under “substantial supervision,” which he said is “in many ways more strict from the rules and restrictions on the person than they would be when she was in the institution from the standpoint of freedom within the confines of the institution.”
Bohren said that “there is no reason to stop the process on conditional release” and that authorities would “go forward with the conditional release program.”
The judge said that the state did not meet its burden of proof to block the release and that he weighed testimony from Geyser’s doctors who knew her. He said that what they saw in the state’s petition to block her release did not change their views about her.
Bohren said the testimony of a therapist who worked at the institution where Geyser stayed “satisfied” him.
Geyser allowed her therapist to testify about their confidential conversations. The therapist said that she had no concerns about Geyser’s attitude in therapy, describing Geyser as being extremely open when she was undergoing therapy, and that she did not have any concerns about Geyser’s behavior.
Bohren also said he saw “no hidden agenda” or evidence of lying or deception on Geyser’s part. He said that he was satisfied with her communication with others in the institution and that it was “truthful and accurate,” and he said she responded well to questions.
The motion to stop Geyser’s release focused on two points of contention: a book that included dark themes that Geyser read and her sending a man artwork of a violent nature while she was under care at the Winnebago Mental Health Institute. Prosecutor Abbey Nickolie told the judge that the man had been “sexually aroused” by Geyser’s crime.
Anthony Cotton, her attorney, told the judge that Geyser willfully disclosed both the book and the contact with the man to the team determining her conditional release. He also said Geyser asked for a no-contact order with the man.
Bohren addressed the book in court Thursday and noted that the sole testimony about the nature of the book was from a doctor who called it “humorous” but said he does not know the accuracy of the doctor’s assertion.
“He basically put the book in context,” Bohren said. “Nobody challenged that context.”
Regarding the man, Bohren said it appeared Geyser stopped contact with him once she realized what he was doing.
He said, “There’s nothing in the record that shows that she did anything to encourage the person besides sending some him some pictures.”
“I don’t find that in and of itself a reason to find she’s at risk for herself or at risk to harm the community in a conditional release plan,” he said. Just because she participated in the contact “doesn’t mean she encouraged it.”
Police said Geyser and Weier lured Leutner to the woods and stabbed her 19 times. Geyser repeatedly stabbed Leutner as Weier egged her on, prosecutors have said.
Leutner’s parents said their daughter mustered the strength to crawl out of the woods because she “wanted to live.”
Geyser was mentally ill in the aftermath of the stabbing, and in 2017 she agreed to plead guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide. She was sentenced to a maximum of 40 years at a mental hospital.
Weier, who did not stab Leutner, was sentenced to 25 years in a mental hospital but was released in 2021 after just four years at Winnebago Mental Health Institute.
A hearing is set for 10:30 a.m. ET March 21 to go over Geyser’s conditional release plan.
