Sven O. Høiby

On 25 August 2006 Høiby told Se og Hør that he had been diagnosed with lung cancer. He died on 21 March 2007, aged 70. Høiby is buried at Kristiansand Cemetery together with his parents.

Father and daughter had reportedly reconciled some time before his death and he was, among other events, invited to attend the baptism of his granddaughter, Princess Ingrid Alexandra, in 2004.

He and Mette-Marit's mother, Marit Tjessem, divorced in 1984. After the divorce, Mette-Marit grew up with her mother, stepfather, and siblings, while visiting her father regularly on weekends. She later revealed in an interview that her father also suffered from alcoholism, which she "had to hide" from her friends. Høiby worked for several years as a journalist in a local newspaper and as a small-scale advertiser and publisher in his hometown. By the time his daughter's relationship to the Crown Prince was publicly known, he had retired from working and was receiving a disability pension.

In his younger days, he participated in athletics. Among others, he achieved a time of 58.0 seconds in the 400 metres hurdles in 1959. He represented the club Kristiansands IF.

Sven Olaf Bjarte Høiby (14 November 1936 – 21 March 2007) was the father of Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway. After his daughter married the Crown Prince, he became a national celebrity due to a number of articles in the yellow press, especially Se og Hør.