MADISON, Wisconsin (AP) – A Wisconsin woman who admitted she helped stab a classmate to please online horror character Slender Man will be released Monday from a mental health institution under strict conditions, according to a judge .
Anissa Weier, 19, will be released after spending nearly four years at the Winnebago Institute of Mental Health in Oshkosh. A parole plan asks her to live with her father, undergo 24-hour GPS surveillance, and receive psychiatric treatment, among other things. You will not be allowed to use the Internet except at home, and the state Department of Corrections will monitor your online activity.
Weier and a friend, Morgan Geyser, were engaged to Winnebago after pleading guilty to attacking Payton Leutner when they were all 12 years old. Geyser stabbed Leutner several times while Weier urged her. Leutner suffered 19 stab wounds, including one that missed his heart, and barely survived.
Waukesha County Judge Michael Bohren said the conditions for Weier’s release were fair and that the plan “provides for the protection of the community,” as well as Leutner and Weier himself.
Weier, dressed in a dark, occasionally smiling suit, said nothing during the 20-minute procedure. The judge delayed his release until Monday after his lawyer, Maura McMahon, said the mental health center could better prosecute her release after the weekend.
“He wants to move on to a productive life,” McMahon told the judge.
Leutner’s family did not want to speak during the hearing. Leutner declined to comment when he arrived by phone on Friday afternoon.
As part of Weier’s release conditions, a case manager will monitor his medication for post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, and a personality disorder. Your mobile phone will not be able to access the Internet and you will not be allowed to use social media. He will also not be allowed to consume alcohol or drugs, enter a bar, have a gun or have any contact with Leutner or his family.
District Deputy Prosecutor Ted Szczupakiewicz said he had no objections to the release conditions.
The attack occurred in May 2014, after Weier and Geyser invited Leutner to sleep. The next day they lured Leutner into the woods of a Waukesha park. Weier and Geyser left Leutner dead, but managed to crawl out of the woods and a cyclist passing by found her.
Police found Weier and Geyser later that day walking on National Highway 94 in Waukesha. Investigators said they attacked Leutner because they thought he would turn them into Slender Man servants and prevent him from killing their families. After the stabbing, they began walking toward the Slender Man mansion, they said.
The character Slender Man emerged from stories on the Internet. He is depicted as a spider figure in a black suit with a white face on white. Sony Pictures released a film about Slender Man chasing three girls in 2018. Weier’s father, Bill, exploited the film as an attempt to capitalize on a tragedy.
Weier eventually pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree manslaughter. Borhen sentenced her to 25 years in Winnebago in December 2017.
In his request for parole, he argued that he had exhausted all treatment options at the facility and that he needed to join society. He promised he would never let himself “become a weapon again.” Bohren ruled in July than Weier it no longer posed a threat and ordered state officials to draw up a release plan.
Geyser pleaded guilty in the attempted first-degree intentional homicide. Bohren sentenced her to 40 years in a mental health center in February 2018. She has argued that her case should have been heard in juvenile court, but an appellate court ruled last year that the case was properly heard in adult court.
His court attorney, Anthony Cotton, said Friday that Geyser has not filed a motion for release and has declined to comment. Judicial records show that during his sentencing, Bohren ruled that parole “would pose a significant risk of bodily injury” to Geyser or others.
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Associated Press writer Doug Glass in Minneapolis contributed to this report.
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