A Wisconsin woman accused of stabbing her classmate to please horror character Slender Man more than a decade ago asked a judge again Friday to release her from a psychiatric hospital.

Morgan Geyser, who is now 22 years old, filed a petition with Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Bohren seeking her release from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute. The petition marks the third time in the last two years she has asked Bohren to let her out of the facility.

She withdrew her first petition two months after filing it in 2022. Bohren denied her second request this past April, saying she remains a risk to the public.

  • @[email protected]
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    9810 hours ago

    So she was 12 when she did it, but is still a danger to others 10 years later if I’m reading correctly.
    Was the psychiatric hospital meant to rehabilitate her?

    • Flying Squid
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      262 hours ago

      Was the psychiatric hospital meant to rehabilitate her?

      You’re cute.

      This is America.

    • @[email protected]
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      538 hours ago

      Was the psychiatric hospital meant to rehabilitate her?

      If possible, otherwise keep her away from pointy items. Working in psychiatry years ago, I’ve met people for whom their psychiatric diagnosis was chronic, and whom you could dope all you wanted, but their psychosis never retreated. All you could do was keep them from hurting themselves or others.

      Sometimes we need a way to shield individuals from the general public, without it actually being a punishment. Lady in the story sounds like an example.

      • Flying Squid
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        2 hours ago

        Being put in a criminal psychiatric facility for life doesn’t sound like “without it actually being a punishment” to me.

        Especially not in the U.S.

        • @TrousersMcPants
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          4 minutes ago

          It depends, I worked in a similar place and the people there lived in relative comfort. Obviously it’s going to be a sad situation regardless, as even in the best of settings they no longer have freedom. but to some of the people in there they preferred it. Many of them had their own collections of books and even some video games and the like in their rooms and they could do things like working at the canteen to occupy their time otherwise. For someone with very severe mental issues, living somewhere that keeps you away from the world and makes sure you’re fed and relatively safe can be preferable.

      • @Dainterhawk999
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        6 hours ago

        Just a question… Are there any mental health issues which cannot be treated? As you have worked in psychiatry, any input will be highly appreciated.

        • @Valmond
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          175 hours ago

          Schizophrenia can be untreatable.

          Fachism sometimes too. \j

            • Flying Squid
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              21 hour ago

              Of course, Hitchcock was his own sort of petty fascist on a film set (and a rapist), so he was probably not the best person to deliver that message.

              I don’t disagree, I’m just saying…

        • @TrousersMcPants
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          14 minutes ago

          I worked (admittedly as a custodian, so not an expert at all) in close contact with people who had antipersonality disorder. These were people who had been convicted of sexual assault and had served a sentence then had been deemed unfit to return to society. I don’t believe any of them could get any amount of treatment that would have made them truly safe around others, even if they behaved well on their wards.

          Mental illness can almost never truly be cured, and some people can be simply too dangerous to be allowed complete freedom. It’s sad to think about, but I think until we have a better understanding of the mind and how to better treat people with issues like this, it’s better that certain people stay “locked up” as it were. So long as they are given humane treatment and accommodations, of course.

      • @TheEighthDoctor
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        128 hours ago

        I mean sure, but at 12 years old you cannot possibly be a lost cause I would think, there is still so much development going on.

        • @[email protected]
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          216 hours ago

          That is like saying a 12 year old should be able to be healed from being quadriplegic because they are still growing. Some medical conditions are for live (at our current medical knowledge) and it doesn’t matter if they are “physical” or “mental”.

            • @ThatWeirdGuy1001
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              83 hours ago

              Just because their brains are still developing doesn’t mean they aren’t developing wrong.

              If the foundation is fucked the whole thing is gonna be fucked no matter how much time you give it.

              Some people are unfortunately born with fucked foundations be they physical or mental.

        • WIZARD POPE💫
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          38 hours ago

          Well you could be. Some people are just born that way.

    • @saltesc
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      88 hours ago

      Well, there’s concerns here. The mind was able to be convinced of the reality of a clearly fictional character. The mind concluded on murder, of all things, as a solution to something. The mind did this almost entirely on its own, despite what it’s been taught and witnessed of others.

      Because people can’t read minds, things observed of that mind will be very carefully assessed. Things like showing vivid imagination, unusual reaction, unusual phases of personality or empathy change, etc. And being so young, connections were likely shaped and formed in impressionable years and these are the hardest to undo; essentially things like personality are established by 12 and the core of it remains relatively unchanged for the entire life.

      She could be ready; she could’ve been ready a few years ago. But it is the job of experts to ensure that mind is extremely unlikely to do that again, and that it isn’t vulnerable to change when released. Get that wrong and the loss is much higher than what is currently occurring.

    • @drunkpostdisaster
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      119 hours ago

      Probably. But this is not the first time something like this happened