Pennington County (trfnews.i234.me) – A Thief River Falls woman has been charged with attempted second-degree murder and second-degree assault after allegedly attempting to cut a child’s throat during a disturbing mental health episode on Sunday morning, July 20, 2025.
According to court documents, Edwina Marie Stoutenbergh, 34, was arrested after the Pennington County Sheriff’s Office received a report that a child’s throat had been cut. Deputies arrived to find several juveniles inside a vehicle, confirmed to be safe, and then encountered Stoutenbergh outside the home in minimal clothing.
She was immediately detained. While in handcuffs, she told deputies, “Don’t take them off,” and made several statements indicating that “they” made her do things. She later identified “they” as demons, which she named bondage and infirmity.
At the emergency room, Stoutenbergh allegedly told law enforcement that she awoke to demons taking control of her. She said the voices made her eat dog feces and the eye of a deceased duck that had been put down the day before. The demons then allegedly told her to kill her children, her husband, and herself, and to drink her son’s blood.
According to her statement, she took a knife from the kitchen and went to a boy’s upstairs bedroom, where she rolled him over in his sleep and attempted to cut his throat. She said the knife was too dull to penetrate the skin and that the voices instructed her to sharpen it. She did so, but stopped in the stairwell, where she allegedly told the children she was going to kill them too.
Stoutenbergh said she couldn’t drop the knife and showed the kids the decapitated duck’s head, then gave them keys to a vehicle and told them to leave.
Deputies later found a severed duck’s head on a cutting board, a bloodied spoon, and a chef’s knife with apparent blood in the kitchen sink. Her husband gave consent to search the property and told deputies he received a frantic phone call from Stoutenbergh saying “they were taking over her body and telling her to kill the children,” prompting him to contact authorities.
The boy, whose age has not been released, reportedly had visible marks on his neck, confirming the attempted attack.
Stoutenbergh was taken to Sanford Medical Center and then booked into the Pennington County Jail. She faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted on the attempted murder charge.
I’m Chris Harper reporting for TRF News.