Jeffrey Dahmer victim’s daughter shares regret at watching show: ‘I haven’t been able to sleep’

‘That chapter of my life was closed and they reopened it, basically’

The daughter of one of Jeffrey Dahmer’s victims has shared her regret after watching the Netflix show Monster about the serial killer.

Errol Lindsey was 19 years old when he was killed by Dahmer on 7 April 1991.

He was survived by five siblings and a partner who was pregnant at the time of his death.

The daughter of Mr Lindsey, 31-year-old Tatiana Banks, told Insider that “honestly ever since that show’s been on I haven’t been able to sleep”.

“I see Jeffrey Dahmer in my sleep,” she said of her nightmares that have lasted weeks.

Ms Banks, of Arizona, was born six months after the death of her father. She said she watched one episode of the show, which she called “heartbreaking”.

The episode she watched included her aunt Rita Isbell giving a victim impact statement during the sentencing hearing for Dahmer.

“I feel like they should have reached out because it’s people who are actually still grieving from that situation,” Ms Banks said of the creators of the show. “That chapter of my life was closed and they reopened it, basically.”

In an as-told-to essay for Insider, Ms Isbell said that “when I saw some of the show, it bothered me, especially when I saw myself — when I saw my name come across the screen and this lady saying verbatim exactly what I said”.

“If I didn’t know any better, I would’ve thought it was me. Her hair was like mine, she had on the same clothes. That’s why it felt like reliving it all over again,” she added. “It brought back all the emotions I was feeling back then.”

“I was never contacted about the show,” Ms Isbell said. “I feel like Netflix should’ve asked if we mind or how we felt about making it. They didn’t ask me anything. They just did it.”

Mr Lindsey’s cousin, Eric Perry, tweeted last month: “I’m not telling anyone what to watch, I know true crime media is huge rn, but if you’re actually curious about the victims, my family (the Isbell’s) are pissed about this show. It’s retraumatizing over and over again, and for what? How many movies/shows/documentaries do we need?”

Ms Banks said she learned of the manner of her father’s death around the age of four or five.

“When I was young, I was told that he was killed by a Milwaukee serial killer,” she said.

At the time of his death, Mr Lindsey’s mother Mildred told the press that “I can’t understand how it happened, how he met Errol”, according to the book Monster: The True Story of the Jeffrey Dahmer Murders by Anne Schwartz.

“Errol wasn’t the type to talk to just anybody. He went to work and then he came home. He was a mama’s boy. He wouldn’t even go out with his friends without calling me to see what I was doing,” she added.

Ms Lindsey told the Associated Press at the time that it was as if her son “just vanished from the world”.

“He didn’t deserve this,” Ms Banks told Insider earlier this month. “I don’t deserve this. None of the victims deserve it.”