Feb. 2 (UPI) — A Wisconsin judge sentenced a teenage girl to 40 years in a mental institution after she pleaded guilty to stabbing a classmate in order to please the fictional character “Slender Man.”
Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Behren ruled Morgan Geyser, 15, must undergo mental health treatment in a state facility in Oshkosh for the maximum term of 40 years. Experts suggested Winnebago Mental Health Institute, where Geyser is currently and which treats adults who have committed crimes, was not the best location for her.
Experts have diagnosed Geyser with the early stages of schizophrenia.
She was the second of two teenage girls to be sentenced for stabbing Payton Leutner in 2014 when all three were 12 years old. In December, Behren ordered 15-year-old Anissa Weier to spend 25 years in a mental facility. Both Geyser and Weier were charged as adults in the crime.
The two teens stabbed Leutner 19 times and left her to die after luring her into the woods after a sleepover. They told police they believed the stabbing would please Slender man, who they believed would kill their families if they didn’t comply.
Leutner survived the nearly fatal attack by crawling to the edge of the woods at a park, where a passing bicyclist found her.
