In an absolutely terrifying story, a court recently heard how Thai man Apai Ruangwong sexually assaulted American backpacker Hannah Gavios in a jungle, causing her to run for help and subsequently fall off a cliff in the darkness.

To make the story even more traumatic, Ruangwong then went and found Hannah again and continued to assault her for a further 10 hours. She was unable to move to escape her attacker due to her injuries.

Unbeknown to the 23-year-old girl, she had broken her back after falling 150 ft off a cliff near Railay Beach in Krabi, Thailand - the holiday destination she was visiting from her base in Vietnam where she had been teaching English.

Hannah with a man she'd previously met on her travels. SWNS

Earlier in the day, Hannah had got lost on the beach and asked a man in a local tourist shop for directions back to her hotel. But it was Ruangwong who worked at the shop, and instead of just giving her the directions, he offered to show her the way himself and ended up guiding her into a jungle.

There, he attacked Hannah, trying to remove her clothes and using his body weight to restrain her. Despite Hannah's attempts at fighting back, by biting part of his ear off, he continued to have his way.

Struggling further, Hannah eventually managed to break away from Ruangwong and fled through the jungle as fast as she could. But by this point it was dark, and she ended up plummeting 150 feet - the equivalent of a 10 storey building - into the undergrowth below.

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This wasn't the end of her ordeal though; her attacker proceeded to make his own way safely down the jungle to find his victim, and continued abusing her for a further 10 hours. Hannah recalled how she believed she wouldn't make it out alive.

"I honestly thought I was going to die," she said. "I hit my head a few times and landed on a big bump. I was screaming in pain. It was the most painful thing ever.

"I felt like a total vegetable. I felt completely vulnerable. I couldn't move anything. I was stuck with this crazy person. I was in the woods in the bushes with wild snakes crawling on me while he was still continuing to harass me. He got on top of me. He didn't rape me but he did everything else."

It's unthinkable how scary it would have been.

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Eventually, Ruangwong decided to end Hannah's ordeal, but left her lying there all alone. Thankfully the backpacker was rescued the following morning, but was unable to feel her legs and was immediately flown back to New York where she remains in hospital.

Unbelievably, Ruangwong was only sentenced to five years in prison for his crimes. Meanwhile, Hannah has been left unable to walk, with her family requiring up to $200,000 (just over £160,000) to pay for the treatment she needs to help her learn to walk again because this type of therapy was not covered in her medical insurance.

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Her mother, Gwen, has spoken out in anger about the light sentence Hannah's attacker was given, saying her daughter will "suffer the consequences of the attack for the rest of her life".

What a terrible, terrible ordeal.

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Catriona Harvey-Jenner Digital Features Editor Cat is Cosmopolitan UK's features editor covering women's issues, health and current affairs.

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