Sherriff to offer updates on Calvert case at press session next week

The Beaufort County Sheriff's Office said Tuesday it will hold a press conference next week to discuss updates on the investigation of aHilton Head Island couple who have been missing since March.

John Calvert, 47, and his wife of more than 20 years, Elizabeth, 46, vanished March 3 after a business meeting in Sea Pines. Friends began to worry and called police March 4 after the couple missed several work appointments.

Sheriff P.J. Tanner would not say Tuesday why he's holding the press conference next Wednesday or the details of what would be discussed.

"I'll respond to that on the press conference date," he said. "That's why we're having a press conference."

He said the Calvert Reward Fund, which stands at more than $65,500, "hasn't brought in any new leads."

Elizabeth Calvert's brother, David White, said in October that in order to push the case back into the national spotlight, he planned to ask Tanner to grant interviews with national television shows. White could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

Tanner said Tuesday the Sheriff's Office doesn't have any information about the possibility of the case appearing on television. But at the press conference, Tanner will summarize the investigation to date and will take questions from the media, according to a Sheriff's Office press release.

The fate of the couple remains shrouded in mystery.

The Calverts' 2006 Mercedes was found three days after their disappearance in the parking lot of the Marriott Grande Ocean Resort in Palmetto Dunes. That location is about six miles from their part-time home, a yacht called the Yellow Jacket moored at Harbour Town.

John Calvert owns the company that operates the yacht basin and three ancillary businesses, including Harbour Town Resorts. Elizabeth Calvert, a business attorney with HunterMaclean in Savannah, is a licensed pilot. Her plane was still parked at the Hilton Head Island Airport.

There were also no signs of the Calverts at their other home, in an upscale Atlanta neighborhood, where their Porsche was found.

On March 11, the last person to see the couple alive committed suicide. Dennis Gerwing, 54, had kept the books for the Calverts. He is accused of embezzling $2.1 million from the couple and seven other clients of The Club Group, a property management and real estate company of which he was the chief financial officer.

Since his death, which left no clues to the couple's whereabouts, there have been few developments in the investigation.

Authorities have conducted a financial inquiry into The Club Group, Gerwing and the Calverts. Detectives also have scoured computers and Blackberry devices for clues.

White, Elizabeth Calvert's brother, quit his advertising job in Atlanta and has been helping run the couple's four businesses. He and co-workers of the couple have also been raising money for the reward fund.