A spokeswoman for the rock band Journey said Michaele and
the group’s guitarist Neal Schon were together in Memphis for a concert. “Nobody
kidnapped her,” said the spokeswoman.
The FBI and law enforcement officials are investigating.
The mix-up, if that is what it was, began late Tuesday when
Tareq Salahi contacted local authorities claiming Michaele was missing and had
left their house without taking any belongings. He believed she was abducted,
according to media reports.
But in a news conference outside the Salahi residence on
Wednesday afternoon, a sheriff’s official from Warren County, Virginia said
Michaele Salahi told their department she left with a good friend, was where
she wanted to be and did not want her husband to know, according to Kris Van
Cleave, a reporter for the local ABC TV station, who spoke to Reuters.
The sheriff’s official said they were working with the FBI
to contact Michaele again in order to “assure her well-being,” and that
officials were in touch with her family and friends.
A Los Angeles-based spokeswoman for Journey and Schon seemed
to put an end to the story by late Wednesday, saying in a statement, “Scoop
Marketing can confirm that nobody kidnapped her and that she and Neal are
together, in Memphis, for Journey’s concert tonight at the Bridgestone Arena.”
This is not the first time the Salahis have created a media
stir. The publicity-hungry couple famously snuck past White House security and
into a state dinner in 2009. The exploit earned them headlines worldwide, and
shortly thereafter she became a castmember on the “Real Housewives” reality TV
show.
In a tearful interview with an NBC TV reporter in prior to
the Warren County sheriff’s new conference, Salahi broke down and denied his
wife’s disappearance was a publicity stunt.
