Teen in Slender Man case is sentenced to 40 years in psychiatric hospital
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A Wisconsin teen who pleaded guilty to trying to kill a friend to curry favor with the fictional Slender Man character was sentenced to 40 years in a psychiatric hospital on Thursday.
Judge Michael Bohren sentenced the girl to the maximum penalty for the crime, committed when she was 12 years old. The friend was stabbed 19 times but survived the 2014 attack. The New York Times, the Associated Press and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel covered the sentencing.
Bohren said the sentence was long, but “this is an issue of community protection.” The teen had pleaded guilty last year to attempted first-degree intentional homicide in a deal in which prosecutors agreed she wasn’t criminally responsible.
A lawyer for the teen, Anthony Cotton, told the Times that a commitment to a psychiatric hospital in Wisconsin can be ended early when a patient is compliant. A petition for conditional release can be filed every six months if there is support by treating staffers at the psychiatric hospital, the Journal Sentinel explains.
Cotton said he plans to file a request as soon as the law allows it.
The teen’s co-defendant, also 12 years old at the time of the attack, had pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree intentional homicide. She was sentenced in December to 25 years in mental commitment.
