20 years on, Katie Beers says kidnapping saved her

OLD WESTBURY, N.Y. (AP) — Twenty years after a New York girl was held for 17 days inside a Long Island dungeon, that now-30-year-old woman is writing about the ordeal.

Katie Beers says that in an odd way, getting kidnapped was the best thing that happened to her.

"Buried Memories: Katie Beers' Story" (Title Town Publishing), has a happy ending. Beers is now the married mother of two who works in insurance sales near her Pennsylvania home.

She is hoping the book released this week to coincide with the 20th anniversary of her freedom helps other victims of sexual abuse and neglect.

Without the notoriety from the kidnapping, she says she may have never been placed in foster care, where she was surrounded by loving parents and siblings.