In a series of raw and emotional interviews, Jamie-Lee Arrow, the daughter of one of Sweden's most infamous criminals, has opened up about the impossible conflict of loving a father convicted of a heinous act. Her father, Isakin Drabbad, was found guilty in 2010 of murdering and cannibalising his girlfriend, Helle Christensen, a crime that earned him the moniker "the Skara Cannibal." More than a decade later, Arrow explains her enduring bond and the painful journey to cut him out of her life.
The Horrific Crime and a Daughter's Discovery
The case that shocked Sweden unfolded in 2010. Isakin Drabbad, a self-proclaimed Satan worshipper who reported visions of demons, murdered his partner, Helle Christensen, and consumed parts of her body. Convicted and deemed mentally unfit, he was committed to a psychiatric institution in 2011 and moved to outpatient care in Katrineholm by 2020.
Arrow, then a teenager, first learned of the death from her mother. "My first reaction was, 'was it dad?' And she said 'yeah'," she recalled on ITV's This Morning. The full, grotesque scale of the crime only hit her through media reports labelling her father a cannibal. "It didn't make sense to me. I didn't find out the full story until my dad told me myself," she revealed.
A Chilling Final Warning and Years of Trauma
In a haunting detail, Arrow shared a last encounter with Christensen. During a meal, Christensen calmly told her, "enjoy your meal, cause this is the last time I'll ever cook for you because Isakin is going to kill me." Arrow, frightened, pleaded with her to stop, but Christensen insisted it was true. She was killed soon after.
Arrow described her childhood visits to her father's home as "stepping into a horror movie." She endured psychological abuse, including his claims they were "angels sent from hell." The trauma led her to struggle with addiction and leave school at 15, a life she has worked hard to turn around.
Love, Forgiveness, and the Final Break
Despite everything, Arrow has been vocal about her inability to stop loving her father. "I believe it's pretty much impossible to stop loving your parents," she stated. She even confronted him directly for the true-crime series Evil Lives Here: The Killer Speaks and visited him afterwards, offering forgiveness.
However, the relationship reached a definitive end when Drabbad sent her a "long, twisted, sick text message" threatening her and her family if she contacted him again. "It gave me the closure I needed," she told PEOPLE. "It was like I needed that to understand how sick it all is." As a mother of two now, she has severed all contact. "It hurts loving someone that is so bad for you," she confessed.
Building a New Life from Darkness
Now 23, Jamie-Lee Arrow is focused on creating a safe and loving environment for her children, a stark contrast to her own upbringing. "I wanna give my kids everything that I never had. I wanna give them safety and unconditional love," she said. She is set to marry her long-term partner and has rebuilt her life with a powerful perspective. "Just because your childhood sucked doesn't mean your entire life has to," she told The Sun. "We have the power over our own lives and we can create something beautiful even if we came from something ugly." Her story is a profound testament to resilience in the shadow of unimaginable crime.
