Warrants issued for potential Slender Man trial jurors

Here's another odd twist in the Slender Man case: Potential jurors who didn't return questionnaires could face arrest.

In hopes of streamlining what could be a difficult and lengthy task of picking two juries for separate trials of the Waukesha girls charged in the 2014 stabbing of their sixth-grade classmate, more than 100 Waukesha County residents were mailed extensive questionnaires earlier this summer.

A dozen who did not return the questionnaires by the deadline were then ordered to appear in court to explain why on Friday.

Only two did, and the other 10 were found in contempt of court by Waukesha County Circuit Judge Michael Bohren and are now the subject of arrest warrants, and $500 fines, WISN-TV, Channel 12 reported.  For the purpose of the hearing, and throughout the trial, the Waukesha court system identified the potential jurors only by a jury identification number.

Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier were 12 on May 31, 2014, when prosecutors say they lured Payton Leutner into some woods, stabbed her 19 times and left her to die. She survived.

Geyser and Weier told detectives they were trying to appease or impress Slender Man, an internet boogeyman. They are charged as adults with attempted first-degree intentional homicide and have pleaded not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect.

The possible jurors found in contempt were among the first batch that would be called in for Weier's trial, scheduled to start Sept. 11. Geyser's trial is set for October.

Bohren on Thursday decided juries for both trials will be sequestered.