Nicholas Godejohn's Motivation For Murdering Dee Dee Blanchard
In 2019, Nicholas Godejohn was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the 2015 murder of Clauddine "Dee Dee" Blanchard, according to 2019 reporting from Missouri-based news outlet the Springfield News-Leader. Before the murder, Godejohn, who was 25 when the murder of Blanchard took place, maintained an online romantic relationship with Blanchard's daughter, Gypsy Rose, who was 23 when her mother died. As was revealed in Godejohn's murder trial, Gypsy Rose's relationship with her own mother was not what it seemed, and Godejohn was caught in the middle (via Biography).
From Big Bend, Wisconsin, Godejohn met Gypsy Rose in 2012 on an online Christian dating site, as Harper's Bazaar notes. Over the course of two years, the couple maintained contact and fell in love. Because of the dark truth at the heart of Gypsy Rose's relationship with her own mother, though, the relationship between the young couple was kept a secret. As Godejohn learned through his communication with Gypsy Rose, his girlfriend was effectively held captive in her own home.
Godejohn wanted to rescue Gypsy Rose
As Biography goes on to note, Dee Dee Blanchard likely managed a behavioral disorder once known as Munchausen syndrome by proxy, but that is now commonly referred to as factitious disorder imposed on another (per Mayo Clinic). Characterizing the mental illness is a caretaker who projects, or takes steps to fabricate, fake illnesses on their dependents, who are often children. Because of this, for the first two decades or so of her life, Gypsy Rose (above) experienced medical treatment at her mother's urging for illnesses that were never real.
Dee Dee even lied about her daughter's age as Gypsy cycled through unneeded treatments for leukemia and muscular dystrophy, among other examples of mistreatment and abuse. As Godejohn and Gypsy Rose became close, the relationship took on a sexual nature through virtual communication, and once in an illicit in-person encounter, as Harper's Bazaar goes on to note. Godejohn and Gypsy Rose considered eloping, and they made making plans for a future together. The only thing, in their view, that stood in their way was Dee Dee Blanchard.
Gypsy Rose urged Nicholas to kill her mother
The solution that Gypsy Rose Blanchard and Nicholas Godejohn concocted to extricate Gypsy Rose from her mother's influence was to kill Dee Dee. As both Godejohn and Gyspy Rose testified in their respective trials — Gypsy Rose was sentenced to 10 years in prison for the part that she played in the crime (via Biography) — the idea for the murder came from Gypsy Rose, and that she provoked Godejohn to carry out the act so that they could be together. Godejohn stabbed Dee Dee Blanchard, who was 48 when she died, in the home that she shared with her daughter near Springfield, Missouri, with a murder weapon supplied to him by Gypsy Rose.
The couple then fled back to Big Bend, Wisconsin, where they were arrested, via Milwaukee news outlet Fox 6. Though Godejohn expressed regret over what he had done, he said his motivation was love and a desire to rescue Gypsy Rose from her predicament, per Springfield News-Leader. According to Godejohn's defense, he was diagnosed autistic and as a result, had a limited capacity to fully comprehend the consequences of his actions. Also according to the Springfield News-Leader, Godejohn said, "I was blindly in love ... That was always very much the case."