Rita Isbell has lived a quiet life after delivering a highly emotional victim impact statement during the Jeffrey Dahmer trial in 1992. Dahmer was convicted for the sickening crime of murdering 17 men and boys between 1978 and 1991. The newly released Netflix series Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, which stars Evan Peters as “The Milwaukee Cannibal,” has received severe criticism for re-traumatizing families. This includes family members of victim Errol Lindsey, Rita Isbell’s brother. Isbell recently spoke to reporter Kelsey Vlamis and disclosed a few things that had been unknown to the public until now.

Isbell shared that her brother has a 31-year-old daughter who has a daughter, which would have made him a grandfather had he lived. She admitted to watching some of Monster, which bothered her, especially the scene where the actress said verbatim what she had said in the courtroom on that day.

“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. It brought back all the emotions I was feeling back then.”

Isbell said she didn’t watch the whole show and did not need to because she lived it, and knows exactly what happened. Now a great-grandmother, Isbell says that while the anger stuck for a long time, she can talk about it with not as much anger and is still learning how to forgive even if she does not understand.

Related: Netflix Dahmer Series Slammed by Family of Victim

The Story of Her Statement Has Gone Viral

Jeffrey Dahmer in court
IFC Films

This is an as-told-to essay based on a conversation with Rita Isbell, the sister of Errol Lindsey, one of Jeffrey Dahmer's victims.

When I found out I could read a victim impact statement, I knew I was going to let Jeffrey Dahmer have it. I just didn't know what I was going to say. I hadn't written anything down. If I had, I would've torn it up anyway. It wouldn't have gotten read. That was my first time ever being in front of him. Whatever I thought I was going to say, that didn't happen. It all just came out in the moment.

My plans were to get up there and say how it made my mother feel and what it did to her and all this other stuff. But no, when I got in front of his face it was a whole new ball game. I recognized evil. I was face-to-face with pure evil. I wasn't scared. That's not me at all. I never had a scared bone in my body. I believe he knew that too. And then I was angry because he wouldn't look at me.

The reason why I said what I said during that impact statement was because, during the trial, they were portraying him as being so out of control he couldn't stop himself. But you have to be in control in order to do the things that he was doing. You have to very much be in control.

So that's why I said: ‘Let me show you what out of control is. This is out of control.’ I was out of body. I wasn't myself in that moment. Whatever I had on the inside, I let it out. I didn't hold it in and later say: ‘Oh, I wish I had said or done this when I had the opportunity to.’ And I think I was speaking for a lot of the other family members of the victims. The officers that pulled me away were really nice to me. They asked me if I needed water. I told them I had a headache, and they offered me painkillers. They were understanding. And then right after that we went outside the courtroom and there were all these news people just rushing me. I didn't even have time to get it together."