NIIGATA – Charles Jenkins, a former U.S. Army deserter who spent nearly four decades in North Korea, has been hospitalized after fracturing a rib at his home in Sado, Niigata Prefecture, city officials said Wednesday.

Jenkins, 66, who is married to freed abductee Hitomi Soga, 47, was hospitalized Saturday after tripping and injuring his chest on Jan. 24, according to the Sado government.

Jenkins thought he was merely bruised and did not seek treatment, but the hospital in Sado found that the fractured rib was protruding into his abdomen and causing internal bleeding, the city said.

Jenkins was transferred by helicopter Wednesday to Niigata University Medical and Dental Hospital in the city of Niigata.

Jenkins deserted to North Korea from South Korea while serving in the U.S. Army in 1965. Soga was abducted by North Korean agents in 1977. After Soga was repatriated in 2002, Jenkins and their two North Korean-born daughters joined her in Japan in July 2004 via Indonesia.