Teen sentenced in Slender Man case
One of two Wisconsin girls who tried to kill a classmate to win favor with a fictional horror character named Slender Man has been sentenced to 25 years in a mental hospital, the maximum punishment possible.
Anissa Weier, 16, pleaded guilty in August to being a party to attempted second-degree intentional homicide, but she claimed she wasn’t responsible for her actions because she was mentally ill. In September, a jury agreed.
Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Bohren on Thursday sentenced Weier to 25 years in a psychiatric institution, retroactive to the date of the crime. That means she would be institutionalized until age 37.
Weier and Morgan Geyser lured Payton Leutner into a wooded park in Waukesha, a Milwaukee suburb, in 2014. Geyser stabbed Leutner 19 times while Weier urged her on, according to investigators. Leutner survived after she crawled out of the woods to a path where a passing bicyclist found her.
Both Weier and Geyser told detectives they felt they had to kill Leutner to become Slender Man’s “proxies,” or servants, and protect their families from him. All three girls were 12 years old at the time.
In a deal with prosecutors, Geyser pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide in return for not being held criminally responsible and not going to prison. Prosecutors have asked that she be given at least 40 years in a mental hospital. She will be sentenced in February.