2025-11-25
Bodycam videos show how ‘Slender Man' attacker was found after escape
New bodycam video shows the moment one of the “Slender Man” attackers was captured in a Chicago suburb after escaping from her group home in Wisconsin over the weekend.The video from police in Posen, Illinois, shows how officers responding to a report of two people loitering behind a Thornton’s Truck Stop at 14840 Western Ave. first encountered Morgan Geyser.In the footage, officers ask Geyser repeatedly for her name, though she refuses to comply. Eventually she provides a name, but officers later determine that name to be fake. Geyser is heard telling the officers she’s “done something really wrong.”“It can’t be that serious,” an officer replies.Eventually Geyser provides her real name, telling the officer, “Trust me, I didn’t want to give it to you. You’ll see why in a second.” Geyser repeatedly says the person with her did not know her real name. Eventually both Geyser and the person with her were taken into custody. The new developments mark the latest update in a case that has spanned more than a decade. WisconsinNov 23Wisconsin ‘Slender Man' stabbing attacker found after escaping group homeCrime and CourtsJan 9Judge releases woman who stabbed a classmate to please Slender Man from a psychiatric hospitalGeyser, one of the attackers who repeatedly stabbed and nearly killed her sixth-grade classmate all to please a fictional horror character known as “Slender Man,” cut off her ankle monitor and escaped from the group home she was in in Madison, Wisconsin.The Madison Police Department said Sunday that Geyser, now 23, had cut off her electronic monitoring device and left her group home on the capital city’s west side. She was last seen around 8 p.m. Saturday with an adult acquaintance, the department said.Geyser’s attorney, Tony Cotton, posted an Instagram video Sunday saying he did not know what happened with his client, and had urged Geyser to turn herself in. In a statement sent to NBC Chicago Monday, Cotton said his “biggest fear” regarding Geyser’s release to the group home was “her ability to navigate new relationships, particularly with older men.”In 2014, Geyser, along with classmate Anissa Weier, lured then-12-year-old Payton Leutner to a wooded area near Waukesha, a suburb of Milwaukee, after a sleepover. While there, Geyser stabbed Leutner more than a dozen times while Weier egged her on.Leutner, who was left for dead, was discovered by a passing bicyclist and taken to a hospital. She barely survived.The girls later told investigators that they attacked Leutner to earn the right to be the fictional character Slender Man’s servants and they feared he’d harm their families if they didn’t follow through. According to prosecutors, the girls plotted the stabbing for months, and they told investigators they believed Slender Man had a mansion in a forest, and they planned to live with him after the attack.Slender Man was created online by Eric Knudson in 2009 as a mysterious figure photo-edited into everyday images of children at play. He grew into a popular boogeyman, appearing in video games, online stories and a 2018 movie.Weier pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree intentional homicide. She was also sent to the psychiatric center and granted release in 2021.Geyser was found not guilty by mental disease or defect and was committed to a mental health institution.She was placed in a group home this year after being granted conditional release from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute.Wisconsin law allows people who plead not guilty due to mental disease or defect to petition a judge for release from the institution where they’re being held every six months. Geyser petitioned four times for release before Waukesha County Judge Michael Bohren finally signed off in March.Prosecutors opposed the release, alleging Geyser had been quietly reading gory novels and communicating with a man who collects memorabilia from murderers.Deputy District Attorney Abbey Nickolie alleged during a hearing that Geyser didn’t tell her treatment team that she was reading novels about murder and the sale of human organs on the black market. She also didn’t inform the treatment team that she was communicating with a man who collects murder memorabilia, allowing him to visit her and sending him artwork of a “very violent nature,” Nickolie told the judge.Geyser’s attorney, Tony Cotton, countered that Geyser only reads books the facility makes available to her and hospital officials track all her communications. She told her treatment team about the books and communications when asked, he said, adding that she can’t have violated any conditions of release because conditions haven’t been set.“Morgan is not more dangerous today,” Cotton said at the March court hearing.The judge ultimately found that Geyser had maximized her treatment and, to be truly rehabilitated, needed to rejoin society.
