It was a day of relief and celebration — and a lot of questions and skepticism.
Two years ago this Saturday Sherri Papini, the then 34-year-old Mountain Gate mother of two young children who disappeared 22 days earlier after going out for a jog near her home, was found safe, although bruised and branded off Interstate 5 near Woodland.
Her mysterious disappearance, as well as her surprising early morning Thanksgiving Day reappearance along I-5 in Yolo County, still bound with restraints while trying to flag down help, captivated a national and international audience.
The news that she'd been found safe circulated about two hours after family, friends and supporters gathered at Diestelhorst Landing in Redding just before the Turkey Trot for a somber balloon release to raise awareness about her disappearance.
Worldwide reaction varied from joyful to cynical.
Plenty of people believed wholeheartedly the woman who grew up in Shasta County, attended Central Valley High School and was once described as a "supermom" was kidnapped. Others were equally convinced she made the whole thing up.
Papini's limited description of her kidnappers and inability or unwillingness to answer all of investigators' questions stoked the skepticism.
Adding more mystery to the case, investigators said male DNA found on Papini's clothes didn't belong to any offenders from a database or Papini's husband, Keith Papini. And while investigators said she told them the fight with one of her captors resulted in a cut on her foot, "when she was being processed at the hospital ... no evidence of a cut was seen in the photographs," a sheriff's report said.
The sketches also seemed to raise more questions than they answered, investigators said.
"Detectives and investigators reviewed the sketches and compared the sketches with known witnesses or contacts identified during the investigation to see if the sketches matched any known parties. No matches were made with case file information," they wrote at the time.
The case is still unsolved, search warrant records that might contain more information are sealed, and no one has been arrested.
Shasta County Sheriff Tom Bosenko said Monday he had no new information to report or release, but insisted the case is not forgotten.
“It’s still an active and ongoing investigation," he said.
Detectives continue to seek anybody who may have information.
Sgt. Brian Jackson, who leads the investigation still, has been with the case since the beginning.
And he remains hopeful a re-evaluation of the evidence, as well any possible tips, may help to bring the case to a conclusion.
"Something is going to reveal itself someday," he said.
Jackson conceded tips regarding the case have dropped off over the past few months, but he balked at describing it as a cold case.
"I wouldn't say it's cold," he said. "There's still several avenues we're looking at." He declined to identify or discuss those leads.
The perplexing case drew intense media interest from around the globe.
There’s even a Wikipedia page about Papini's alleged kidnapping.
Papini has told sheriff’s detectives that two Hispanic women armed with a handgun abducted her, beat her and held her captive in a basement until one of them decided to dump her during the early morning hours on the side of a road in Yolo County.
Last year, the sheriff’s office released FBI-prepared composite sketches of the two women who allegedly kidnapped her, as well as information that she had been texting a man in Michigan, who was later ruled out as a suspect.
The sheriff's office last year also released surveillance footage of Papini running around a church parking lot moments after her release, apparently looking for help.
Jackson has said Papini had bruises indicating she was assaulted multiple times, her hair was cut to shoulder-length and she had a brand on her right shoulder that investigators still couldn't make out because of its "obscure letters" and poor quality.
Like Bosenko, Jackson urges anyone who has information about the case to contact the sheriff's office.
With the Papini case grabbing headlines and TV news coverage, the mysterious case of a Trinity County woman who disappeared around the same time received scant attention.
It, too, remains unsolved two years later.
Fifty-two-year-old Stacey Smart was last seen by her family at her Lewiston home on Oct. 12. She was reported missing Nov. 2, the same day as Papini.
And her family, which held a candlelight vigil for Smart earlier this month at the historic Lewiston Bridge to continue to raise awareness about her disappearance, still hope for answers.
A $10,000 reward has been offered by Trinity County Secret Witness for information leading to Smart's whereabouts and the family continues to maintain a Help Find Stacey Smart page on Facebook.
A spokesperson for the Trinity County Sheriff's Office could not be reached Tuesday to comment about the case.
