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REDDING, California -- A 34-year-old California mother who went missing for nearly three weeks while jogging was found on the side of a road beaten, chained and with a bag over her head, her husband said in his first comments since she was abducted.
Keith Papini told Good Morning America that his wife, Sherri Papini, weighed only 87 pounds when she was found.
"Nothing could have prepared me for what I was about to see upon my arrival at the hospital, nor the details of the true hell I was about to hear," he wrote in the statement to GMA. "My first sight was my wife in a hospital bed, her face covered in bruises ranging from yellow to black because of repeated beatings, the bridge of her nose broken."
Keith Papini also shot down speculation that she was not actually kidnapped.
"We are not going to allow those people to take away our spirit, love, or rejoice in our girl found alive and home where she belongs," Keith Papini wrote. "I understand people want the story, pictures, proof that this was not some sort of hoax, plan to gain money, or some fabricated race war. I do not see a purpose in addressing each preposterous lie."
Authorities said they have no reason not to believe the story.
The Shasta County Sheriff's Department said Papini had been found "out of the area" without offering many details, according to KTXL.
An iPhone, a pair of earbuds and a few strands of what was believed to be her hair were the only leads into her possible whereabouts in days after Papini went missing on November 2nd.
The sheriff’s department said Papini flagged down traffic along a roadway in Yolo County early Thursday, November 24th. Officials said Papini freed herself from restraints before catching the attention of a motorist on the roadway.
Keith Papini's full statement to "Good Morning America" read: