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Calverts' family, friends take cruise to raise money for reward fund

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Friends, relatives and business associates of John and Elizabeth Calvert hope a sunset charity cruise Sunday evening will eventually help turn up clues about the missing couple's fate.

About 100 people who know the Calverts boarded the Spirit of Harbour Town for the three-hour cruise to raise money for the Calvert Reward Fund, started by Elizabeth Calvert's brother to entice anyone with information to come forward.

They also hope a significant reward will encourage private investigators to take the case and dig up information to supplement work done by the Beaufort County Sheriff's Office.

Depending on the results of a silent auction, that reward now stands at about $50,000.

"We're at a point where we'd be open to anything," said David White of Decatur, Ga., Elizabeth Calvert's brother, "and I'd also think the Beaufort County Sheriff's Office would be up for anything to unwrap this mystery."

LACK OF CLUES

The mystery of the missing couple began not far from where Sunday's charity cruise departed.

John Calvert, 47, an island businessman and owner of four companies, including the one that operates the Harbour Town Yacht Basin, and Elizabeth Calvert, 46, a high-powered business attorney with HunterMaclean in Savannah, the largest law firm in Georgia outside of Atlanta, split time between a yacht, the Yellow Jacket, in Harbour Town and a house in a wealthy Atlanta enclave.

They were last seen headed to a meeting with their business associate, 54-year-old Dennis Gerwing, on March 3. The next day, neither showed up for business engagements.

Their 2006 Mercedes was found a few days later parked at the Marriott in Palmetto Dunes, and Elizabeth Calvert's plane was still on the tarmac at the Hilton Head Island Airport.

The Calverts' homes and vehicles yielded no clues, a frustration for detectives, but the biggest disappointments were yet to come.

FEW LEADS EMERGE

The case drew national media coverage in those first days, culminating with the suicide of Gerwing on March 11, the same day he was publicly called a "person of interest" in the disappearance.

Gerwing, chief financial officer of The Club Group, a property management and real estate company, left few clues in his final written words, erratically scrawled on a bed sheet and a piece of paper, law enforcement officials have said.

In the notes discovered near his slashed, bloodied body, Gerwing apparently admitted to stealing money, but remained silent about the Calverts' disappearance. He had killed himself after being interviewed by investigators on one occasion, but before a more comprehensive interrogation could take place.

An audit initiated by The Club Group after Gerwing's death accused the chief financial officer of embezzling $2.1 million from the Calverts and seven other clients.

Those who know the couple have said John and Elizabeth Calvert had

discovered the money was missing and they blamed Gerwing, who kept the books for John Calvert's four businesses. The couple planned to confront Gerwing and had already begun the process of moving their companies' accounting in-house.

Both the Beaufort County Sheriff's Office and the FBI have conducted their own financial inquiries into The Club Group and the Calverts.

Last month, Sheriff P.J. Tanner said detectives had discovered "things of interest" and new avenues for the investigation after studying The Club Group's financial records. He did not go into many specifics, but said more documents were being collected.

Tanner said the items discovered don't implicate The Club Group directly, but point to other entities the company may have been involved with.

A detective recently checked with local taxi companies to determine if any of them had picked up a customer near where the Calverts' Mercedes was found in Palmetto Dunes and taken them to the side of the airport where private planes are stored.

PLEA FOR INFORMATION

Friends of the Calverts are convinced that someone has information about what happened to John and Elizabeth, who traveled in wide social and professional circuits in both South Carolina and Georgia.

They say they have no more information than reporters do and rely on news articles for updates on the investigation.

White, who has assumed oversight of the Calverts' four businesses, is asking for any information big or small about his sister and brother-in-law.

"If someone wants to remain anonymous, (the Sheriff's Office) will protect their identity," he said. "We'll do whatever it takes. We need to get something going."

People don't just vanish into thin air, said Nancy Cappelman, harbormaster at the yacht basin.

"How could somebody not know something?" asked Cappelman. "We need them to come forward and provide some answers."

Sheriff Tanner said Sunday night that he hoped the fund would grow and bring in results.

"We hope it helps and that people will come forward with information that will help us," he said.

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