Morgan Geyser, one of two teenage girls who stabbed their friend in an attempted killing inspired by the fictional internet character Slenderman, has appeared in court to be sentenced.
Morgan, who is now 15, was 12 when she and Anissa Weier attacked Payton Leutner in the woods after a sleepover in a suburb of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 2014.
They stabbed her 19 times then left her for dead, later claiming that they carried out the killing because the fictional internet character Slenderman would hurt their family if they did not.
Morgan was found not guilty of attempted murder by way of insanity last year and has been diagnosed as schizophrenic.
Her lawyers want her to be granted supervisional release to live with her parents but prosecutors want her to be given the maximum, 40 year sentence in a mental institution.
On Thursday morning, Morgan spoke only to answer the judge’s questions, softly replying: ‘Yes, sir’ and ‘no, sir’ when prompted.
She is wearing her own clothes and was shackled for the morning but was allowed to take her waist chain off for the afternoon.
She is taking at least three different medications – two to treat her schizophrenia and at least one antidepressant.
Payton’s parents sat almost directly behind her in the front row of the public gallery. They are not expected to speak.
Morgan Geyser, 15, appears in court in Waukesha, Wisconsin, on Thursday to be sentenced. She will learn how long she will spend in a mental health institution for the 2014 stabbing of her friend
Weier was sentenced to 25 years in a mental institution last year.
During the sentencing hearing on Thursday, psychologist and psychiatrists who have treated Geyser since the stabbing testified about how she heard voices and experienced hallucinations.
One claimed that she had confided in them that she was still hearing voices from someone called ‘Maggie’ as recently as October last year.
Others described her as a ‘very bright and compassionate’ youngster with an IQ of 130, close to the threshold for a genius.
One doctor told how she was ‘extremely remorseful’ about what she had done and was scared to stop taking her medication in fear of returning to the depths of psychosis.
‘Morgan is a bright child and the treatment has been very effective.
‘She is an empathic, kind, compassionate and bright young woman who is very remorseful about what has taken place,’ psychiatrist Kenneth Robbins told the court.
He said there had been a ‘dramatic turnaround’ since she was arrested and revealed that she was not sympathetic to Payton or her family when she was first admitted to custody.
Morgan, 15, was calm and soft spoken throughout the hearing. She spoke only to answer the judge ‘yes, sir’ and ‘no, sir’ when prompted by her attorneys. The 15-year-old wore her own clothes, had painted nails and had shackles around her waist
Victim: Payton Leutner (seen left before the attack aged 12 and right in a recent picture released by her family) was stabbed 19 times and had to crawl to a road to safety
Payton was stabbed 19 times. She survived by crawling to a road and flagging down a passing cyclist
‘She had a pretty hard shell. She looked like she did not have any clear empathy for the young woman who was victimized and she felt like she had done what she had to do to protect her family.
‘She had very little insight into what had led to her behavior. That all has really transformed.’
Dr. Robbins however recommended that she should not be released, instead saying she ought to stay in a facility where she could interact with people her age.
Another doctor said she had been reluctant to go to ‘school’ – two and a half hours of teaching she receives a week – and has a ‘reduced hope for the future’.
That doctor, Dr. Kent Berney, said she would suffer schizophrenia for the rest of her life.
‘She has never acted out aggressively, she has never threatened anyone, she has never been in any physical or verbal altercation with any staff or parents,’ he said.
The only times she has been disciplined in custody were when she ‘stuck up for another patient who was being bullied’ and was caught running in the hallway.
Since she has been at the mental institution, she has had no internet access and has been communicating with her family, who visit her frequently, on the phone and in letters.
Anissa Weier and Morgan were obsessed with the fictional internet character at the time and told police they believed they would be killed unless they hurt their friend. They are pictured in their mugshots aged 12 in 2014
Geyser is pictured in October, 2017, when she was visibly distressed and speaking with her lawyer
At present, she is being treated in a mixed sex, adult unit of the Winnebago Mental Health Institute in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.
All of the doctors who testified on Thursday morning said Morgan was compliant with taking medication and that she had improved.
Two said she should not be released into the community and one, who has worked with her the closest, said she could be considered for release because she did not pose a danger to herself or others.
Morgan’s mother Angie took part in a recent ABC interview where she said there were no warning signs her daughter was violent
Morgan’s sentencing will bring an end to the case.
On Wednesday, her mother and Anissa’s mother both repeated their earlier claims that there were no warning signs that either of their daughters was violent.
They said they had heard of Slenderman but that neither knew what they were plotting.
Morgan and Payton were friends, according to Morgan’s mother, and acted like ‘typical’ tweens.
‘They [Morgan and Payton] would sit up in Morgan’s room and they would do each other’s nails, and they would laugh, and make a mess.
‘They were just typical girls,’ Angie Geyser told ABC.
She said watching her daughter’s confession, during which she told police calmly and plainly that she had been trying to kill Payton, was disturbing.
‘I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I never would have imagined that my daughter was capable of hurting another person,’ she said.
Payton’s family have not spoken publicly about the stabbing but her mother Stacie submitted a victim impact statement to the judge in Weier’s case.
She told how her daughter slept with scissors for ‘months’ after the attack because she was so haunted and how she still has scars from where she was knifed.
WHO IS SLENDER MAN? THE ONLINE MYTH TEENAGERS BELIEVED BEFORE STABBING THEIR FRIEND
The Slender Man is a fictional character that originated in an online art contest in 2009, before becoming a popular meme.
It is what drove Anissa Weier and Morgan Geyser to stab their friend Payton Leutner 19 times in May 2014 in Wisconsin.
The girls feared their own families would die if they did not follow its orders.
The mythical creature is often depicted as an unnaturally tall, thin figure with a blank, featureless face, wearing a black suit.
The character is said to have creepily long, tentacle-like arms, which can be extended to capture prey.
It is described as stalking, abducting and traumatizing children, and – depending on variations of the urban legend – can cause memory loss, insomnia and paranoia.
It is also said to be able to create distortions in photographs and teleport.
The character is understood to have originated in a Photoshop contest on the forums of comedy website Something Awful in 2009.
It then went viral, with numerous works of fan art and short scary stories – known as ‘creepypasta’ – published online.
The character has developed its own life online, with two feature-length films funded in part by Kickstarter appearing in 2012, along with many amateur video games and pop-culture references.