By Amanda Musa, Chris Boyette, CNN
File photo. Morgan Geyser appears in a Waukesha County courtroom, Wisconsin, in January. Photo: Morry Gash / AP / File via CNN Newsource
Morgan Geyser, who was living under supervised release at a group home in Wisconsin for her role in the high-profile 2014 stabbing of her 12-year-old classmate, was found about 150 miles (240km) away in Illinois.
She had disappeared on Saturday night (US time) after cutting off her monitoring bracelet, according to police in Madison, Wisconsin.
On Sunday, officers in Posen, Illinois, responded to a report of people loitering behind a truck stop building and discovered a man and a woman sleeping on the sidewalk, police said.
Geyser, 23, initially gave officers a false name when they confronted her, according to Posen Police.
"After continued attempts to identify her, she finally stated that she didn't want to tell officers who she was because she had 'done something really bad,' and suggested that officers could 'just Google' her name," police said.
Years earlier, Geyser had pleaded guilty to attempted murder in the stabbing of her classmate, Payton Leutner. At the time, they were both 12 years old.
The grisly attack gripped the public's attention and became the subject of heavy news coverage at the time, raising questions about how parents can keep tabs on everything kids consume online, and how they can be sure their children can truly separate reality from fantasy.
The crime was said to be inspired by the fictitious character Slender Man.
Here's what we know about the search for Geyser and the internet-created boogeyman that prompted an attack that shocked the nation more than a decade ago.
Who is Slender Man?
Slender Man, a menacing, faceless man in a dark suit - sometimes portrayed with octopus-like tentacles - was a crowdsourced internet-created boogeyman that first appeared in an online forum in 2009, according to Shira Chess, an associate professor of entertainment and media studies at the University of Georgia and co-author of the book Folklore, Horror Stories, and the Slender Man.
"He falls broadly into a category of fiction that is colloquially referred to as 'creepypasta,' or internet legends that have meme-like qualities, typically lack known authorship, and are easily spreadable," Chess told CNN in an email on Sunday.
In June 2009, a Photoshop contest for images that appeared to be paranormal was launched in a forum on the website Something Awful. According to Know Your Meme, a blog that chronicles web culture, the goal of the contest was to create the images and then use them to fool, or "troll," other web users by submitting them to paranormal websites.
A recent image provided from the Madison Police Department of Morgan Geyser, captured on security video from this past month. Photo: Madison Police Department via CNN Newsource
Site member Eric Knudsen (under the screen name "Victor Surge") submitted two images to the contest, both black-and-white images of children, one of which appeared to show a largely undefined figure lurking in the background.
Many imaginative fans saw Slender Man's facelessness as a blank canvas in which to reimagine him in any number of ways, Chess added.
Following the stabbing, Geyser and her friend Anissa Weier told police they knew the character from the Creepypasta Wiki, a site that compiles such fiction. The site has issued a statement condemning the attack.
Slender Man's popularity has gone down in recent years, according to Chess, who noted the fandom peaked in the early to mid-2010s.
"I can anecdotally say that he still performs the role of boogeyman on playgrounds," Chess told CNN.
How did the stabbing unfold?
In May 2014, the trio had gone to Geyser's home for a slumber party to celebrate her birthday, Leutner previously told ABC. During those times, Geyser constantly talked about Slender Man, she added.
"I thought it was odd. It kind of frightened me a little bit," Leutner said of her friends' fascination with the character. "But I went along with it. I was supportive because I thought that's what she liked."
As the friendship between Geyser and Weier grew, so did the pair's fixation with Slender Man, Leutner said. While Leutner didn't know her friends planned to harm her, something felt off that night in retrospect, she said.
"At all of our past sleepovers, (Geyser) always wanted to stay up all night because she could never do that at home," Leutner said. "But on (the night of) the birthday party, she wanted to go to bed."
Her friends later told investigators they had planned to kill Leutner in her sleep that night but then decided to do it the next morning at a nearby park.
When she woke up, Geyser and Weier were downstairs at a computer, so she joined them for doughnuts before heading to the park. They told her the plan was to play hide-and-seek and asked her to lie down under the leaves and sticks as part of the game, she said.
There in the woods, Geyser repeatedly stabbed her with a kitchen knife and she and Weier left her alone in the woods, bleeding and struggling to get help. After she crawled out of the woods, a passing bicyclist found her and called 911.
Leutner was stabbed near her heart, and she was "one millimeter away from certain death," court documents said.
When the bicyclist found her, the girl pleaded, "Please help me. I've been stabbed," audio from the 911 call revealed.
At age 15, Geyser pleaded guilty to a charge of attempted first-degree murder in a deal with prosecutors to be placed in a mental institution instead of serving jail time.
Weier pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree homicide due to mental illness or defect as part of a plea agreement. She was committed to 25 years in a mental hospital, The Associated Press reported, but was released in 2021 on condition she live with her father and wear a GPS monitor.
At her sentencing in 2018, Geyser apologized to Leutner and her family.
"I never meant this to happen," a tearful Geyser said. "I hope that she is doing well."
Where was Morgan Geyser?
Authorities said Sunday they were searching for Geyser, who was last seen in a residential neighborhood on the west side of Madison, Wisconsin, around 8pm on Saturday with an adult acquaintance, police said in a statement.
Police later said in an update they received confirmation around 10.34 pm that Geyser had been taken into custody in Illinois.
The pair traveled from Wisconsin by bus, Posen police said.
Authorities have not identified the acquaintance - who they say was taken into custody - but Posen police told The Associated Press he is 42 years old, was charged with criminal trespassing and obstructing identification and has since been released.
Geyser's attorney, Tony Cotton, had earlier urged the 23-year-old to turn herself in immediately, saying in a statement: "We worked too hard to secure her freedom for her to continue on this path."
It is unclear how Geyser broke out of the group home or who helped her, Cotton said in a video posted to social media.
CNN has reached out to Cotton for comment on her capture.
In January, a judge ordered Geyser could be released from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute, where she spent nearly seven years, The Associated Press reported.
Prosecutors attempted to block her release, alleging she has been quietly reading gory novels and communicating with a man who collects memorabilia from murderers, but a Waukesha County Circuit judge ordered her release after state and county health officials completed a community supervision and housing plan.
CNN has been unable to determine who runs the group home where Geyser was staying, but Madison police confirmed to CNN affiliate WMTV she has been living at a group home in Madison, on the same street where she had last been seen before fleeing Wisconsin.
Geyser faces no additional charges in Illinois, Posen police said, but will be held at Cook County jail to await extradition back to Wisconsin.
-CNN
