Two 12-year-old girls from Wisconsin are accused a stabbing a friend 19 times in order to please an internet legend known as Slender Man.
The girls are charged as adults with first-degree attempted homicide , with each facing up to 60 years in prison if convicted.
A criminal complaint said the girls had planned for months to murder their 12-year-old friend and invited the girl to a slumber party over the weekend. A day after the sleepover, the girls were playing hide and seek in the park when the pair reportedly attacked.
The victim was stabbed 19 times, including one stab wound that missed her heart by a millimeter, doctors told police. The victim screamed that she hated the pair and then stumbled away. When the girls left, the victim was able to crawl through the woods to a path, where she was found by a bicyclist.
One of the alleged attackers told police that they had planned the killing since December. They hoped to become “proxies” of Slender Man, a fictitious demon-like character they read about on creepypasta.wikia.com, a website with horror stories.
The site describes the mythical creature as:
“Slender Man generally appears (in modern times) as a tall man in a black or grey suit, red or black tie, and white shirt, with no eyes, mouth, or clearly defined facial features. It has no hair, and generally has normal-looking bare hands. Slenderman typically is depicted in imagery and literature as between 6 and 15 feet tall, depending on the situation, and in video as around 6-7 feet tall.”
The pair said after the killing, they planned to run away to Slender Man’s forest mansion.
One of the girls claimed she sees Slender Man in her dreams, adding that he can read her mind and teleport.
From its beginnings on the internet, the Slender Man legend has taken on quite a life. Last year, a video game called Slender: The Arrival was released for Oculus Rift, turning the story of the creepy blank-faced man into an action game.
There was also a Slender Man movie released in 2013 that borrowed the concept from the meme.
The two 12-year-old girls accused of stabbing their friend 19 times to please Slender Man are being held with bail set at $500,000 each.