In an attempt to appease the legendary horror figure Slender Man (also known as Slenderman), 12-year-old Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier stabbed their close buddy 19 times.
It is thought that the Slender Guy persona first appeared in a 2009 picture of a tall, slender guy with limbs that resemble tentacles and powers like teleportation and mind control. On websites that discuss horror stories, Creepypasta, Slender Man got viral.
In an attempt to become “proxies” for the persona, whom they thought was real, Weier and Geyser became fascinated with Slender Man together and planned to murder their classmate, Payton Leutner.
On May 31, 2014, Weier and Geyser lured Leutner into the woods, where they stabbed her 19 times before abandoning her for dead, but she lived. The case served as the basis for both the 2018 Joey King feature film Slender Man and an HBO documentary.
What happened to Anissa Weier, Morgan Geyser, and survivor Payton Leutner in the ten years following the Slender Man stabbing is all covered here.
Geyser, Weier, and Leutner attended Horning Middle School in Waukesha, Wisconsin, a suburb of Milwaukee.
In fact, Leutner had been the first to be friends with Geyser. Leutner recalled in a 20/20 program that she became friends with Geyser after observing her eating lunch by herself. In addition, she said that her ex-friend was humorous and “a little lonely.”
However, Leutner claimed that once Geyser made friends with Weier in the sixth grade in 2014, their relationship shifted. Leutner wanted to keep her distance from Geyser after Weier and Geyser became fixated on Slender Man.
“I found it strange.” I was a little scared, but I accepted it,” Leutner said, ABC host David Muir said on 20/20 in 2019. “I was supportive because I thought that’s what she liked.”
But eventually, Leutner began to think about severing her friendship with Geyser. “I saw the change from fifth to sixth grade when she met Anissa,” she said. “That’s when I was really wanting to get out of that friendship.”
Geyser and Weier thought Slender Man was genuine and lived in the northern Wisconsin woods, according to The New York Times.
According to The New York Times, Geyser and Weier plotted Leutner’s murder over several months in an attempt to serve as “proxies” for the made-up horror figure. In February 2014, Weier and Geyser selected May 31 of that year for the attempted slaying, using code phrases such as “cracker” for knife and “camping trip” for the woods where they thought Slender Man lived.
Police claim that after luring Leutner into a park in Wisconsin, Weier and Geyser alternately urged each other to stab her, with Geyser actually doing so 19 times as Weier looked on. After that, they abandoned Leutner for dead, yet he lived. A bystander called 911 and waited with Leutner until paramedics came after she crawled to a nearby bike path.
The girls were caught up by local police after they discovered Weier and Geyser, who were both 12 at the time, strolling along the side of the road kilometers from the scene of the crime. When they told detectives that they killed their friend to please Slender Man, who they believed would kill them or their families if they didn’t kill Leutner, they reportedly did it casually. Geyser told cops, covered in blood, “I might as well just say it. We were trying to kill her.”
First-degree intentional homicide was the charge against both Geyser and Weier. They were tried as adults despite their age.
Weier entered a guilty plea to second-degree attempted homicide as a participant in a crime involving the use of a deadly weapon in August 2017. A jury found Weier not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect the following month, finding that she was mentally ill at the time of the murder attempt.
Weier was given a maximum term of 25 years in a mental health hospital as part of her plea deal. Before she could request supervised release, which would be a component of the commitment order, she had to stay in a mental health facility for at least three years. Additionally, she received credit for the three years she spent in a juvenile correctional center.
In court filings, Geyser’s lawyers contended that she had schizophrenia and psychotic spectrum disorder, which contributed to her propensity for paranoid thoughts and delusions. In October 2017, while crying in court, she entered a guilty plea and was confined to a mental health facility.
She was declared not guilty by reason of mental illness or condition despite her plea agreement. According to the Associated Press, Judge Michael Bohren sentenced her to 40 years in a mental hospital, citing “an issue of public protection.”
After the attack, Leutner spent ten days in the hospital and had up to eight weekly doctor’s appointments while she recovered. In September 2014, she went back to Horning Middle School for seventh grade. As before Weier and Geyser’s attack, Leutner volunteered at an animal shelter, participated in school music programs, and excelled academically, according to a family spokeswoman. In order to deal with the trauma of the stabbing, she and her family each sought counseling.
Leutner first discussed the Slender Man stabbing in public in October 2019, telling Muir in a 20/20 interview that even five years after the incident, she continued to sleep with broken scissors under her pillow. She also disclosed that she did feel a certain amount of gratitude for what had occurred to her.
“Just because of what she did, I have the life I have now,” Leutner said. “I really, really like it, and I have a plan. I didn’t have a plan when I was 12, and now, I do because of everything that I went through. I wouldn’t think that someone who went through what I did would ever say that, but that’s truly how I feel. Without the whole situation, I wouldn’t be who I am.”
On September 13, 2021, Weier, then 19 years old, was freed from Winnebago Mental Health Institute in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, following his application for conditional release in March 2021. She received inpatient mental health treatment for over four years. She is not allowed to use the Internet outside of her father’s house and is required to live with him. Her online behavior is tracked by the Department of Corrections.
Weier is also required to continue receiving psychiatric therapy and is monitored by GPS around the clock.
Geyser’s request for early release from Winnebago Mental Health Institute was denied by Judge Bohren on April 21, 2024, following the recommendation of two court-appointed psychologists that she continue receiving inpatient psychiatric treatment. Geyser said in a 2022 examination that she was “faking” her psychotic symptoms to avoid being sent to her father’s care, claiming he mistreated her, according to one of the psychologists.
A judge authorized Geyser’s release in January 2025, according to the Associated Press, after expert testimony indicated that she had made significant progress while at Winnebago Mental Health Institute and was no longer deemed a safety risk.
The judge mandated that Geyser, now 22, live in a group home under supervision for 60 days after her release.
