A San Diego woman whose husband reported her missing and possibly kidnapped on Sunday was found safe in Tijuana on Wednesday.

Crystal Chappell, 40, was sitting on a sidewalk, alone, when some passers-by recognized her from a missing person’s flier and called local authorities, San Diego police said.

Her husband, Jonathan Chappell, said a San Diego police investigator phoned him in the afternoon to let him know Crystal was found, and would be given a medical evaluation. If she does not need further treatment, Mexican authorities will take her to the border and release her.

He said he was told that Crystal appeared to be under the influence of something.


Chappell said he still believes his wife was forced by some carjacker or kidnapper to drive south across the border, but that investigators have “maintained the entire time that my wife left her children voluntarily, left her happy home voluntarily.”

He said that Crystal was supposed to pick up their two youngest children, ages 12 and 13, from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in Mission Valley late Sunday morning. The couple had driven separately to a plasma-donation center in the Midway District, where they donated plasma. Chappell had their 19-year-old son with him and they were to all meet back at their Oak Park home.

The younger children phoned Chappell about 40 minutes later and wondered where their mother was, Chappell said. He called his wife’s phone and got no answer. He then tracked it to a location on south Interstate 805 at the Plaza Boulevard exit near the Mexican border.

Chappell said he and two friends repeatedly searched the off-ramp area but didn’t find Crystal’s phone.


He said he did not believe she would head into Mexico of her free will, since she doesn’t speak Spanish and needs oxygen treatments to aid her sleep apnea breathing difficulties. He talked to reporters about Crystal’s disappearance, in hopes of spreading the word so someone would find her.

“If it wasn’t for the news, she wouldn’t have been found,” he said. He said he has spent the last several days handling out fliers with her photograph. San Diego police issued a flier on Tuesday.

Chappell expressed anger that investigators would not give him details about Crystal’s condition and would not tell him where she was being taken for a medical evaluation, because of medical privacy laws. He said he was told that once Crystal is taken to the border, it will be up to her to call him.

“My daughter is so thrilled, my son is so thrilled, they’re asking when can we go see her, and I have to tell them we can’t, we have to wait for a phone call that might not come,” Chappell said.