EXCLUSIVE: 'Gossip Girl' actress Chanel Banks speaks out after going missing, says she’s 'finally free'

LOS ANGELES (TCN) -- "Gossip Girl" and "Blue Bloods" actress Chanel Banks spoke exclusively to "True Crime News" after she was reported missing, revealing, "Not only am I OK, but I’m finally free."

Banks' family last spoke with her on Oct. 30 and later reported her missing to the Los Angeles Police Department. Her family said police conducted welfare checks at Banks' apartment on Nov. 7 and Nov. 8, but she was nowhere to be found. Banks' cousin made her way inside her home on Nov. 10 and discovered that Banks left everything at home — including her dog — except for her phone and laptop.

Law enforcement reportedly located Banks on Nov. 13, but her family argues it isn’t actually her.

"True Crime News" spoke exclusively with Banks via FaceTime and viewed her driver’s license as proof of her identity. Banks broke her silence in a written statement given to "True Crime News" about her decision to leave town and what motivated her to do so. "True Crime News" has not corroborated Banks' claims but has contacted her family for comment.

Banks described herself as an "American nobody," saying she has "been silently carrying the pain of the ritual … abuse, manipulation, and outright endless torment I’ve endured continuously since I was a defenseless baby at the hands of my own so-called family, whom are all so very 'concerned' about my current whereabouts."

Banks said she has not spoken to her cousin, the same one who searched her apartment, "in over 15 years, much less every day or 48 hours."

Banks confirmed she spoke with police and verified her identity. Banks traveled out of town to get baptized, but she saw the trip away as "an opportunity to escape my cage."

She shared, "God said, 'I’m going to give you some money,' and I was shocked when it appeared just like He said. Then He said, 'I want you to move.' So, I made my Exodus and took my Freedom Ride first class (on Spirit Airlines, no less) to the Promised Land."

Banks said she wants "everyone suffering in silence" to feel that same sense of freedom.

Banks told us, "I want to come out so that people like me won’t be ashamed anymore. I want justice. I’m asking God to help me get justice. I’m releasing a clarion call to those in high places who still have a soul and want to keep it in such a time as this. Reach out. Help the cause. Help me. I will never allow myself to be silenced ever again — least of all by my abusers."

According to Banks, she "had to endure the most abominable abuses" for her entire life, adding, "For decades, my family has been my spiritual, physical, and emotional warden giving me zero authority of my personage. I was not allowed to make any decisions in life in any way without their approval."

She claimed her family would "falsify official government documents relaying lies concerning my mental health" whenever she tried to leave.

Banks alleged, "When I spoke up, they called me mad, mercilessly gang-stalked me, and obliterated any semblance of peace, a career, or connections I ever had. In this digital era, they were able for decades without my knowledge or consent to reach out to my colleagues, friends, and even neighbors to sabotage and effectively destroy not only my life’s work but any semblance of happiness or peace I could hold on to."

She also claimed her family "took shifts to isolate me by gaslighting me" and that it was their "life’s goal to destabilize and break me."

Banks alleged she found out hours before she was supposed to depart for her baptism that her family and her husband’s family "were vehemently pursuing a conservatorship to silence me."

Banks ended her letter, "There will be no more lies. Everything in the darkness must come to light. Thus says the Lord."