Seafaring saga continues: Wife searches for husband who abandoned boat in New Smyrna Beach

Volusia Sheriff Mike Chitwood isn't the only one looking for the sailor who reportedly wrecked and abandoned his sailboat on New Smyrna Beach last fall and then vanished.

The sailor’s wife is also trying to track him down.

Amber Grimes, of Concord, California, told the sheriff’s office that she did not know that her husband Michael J. Grimes had bought a sailboat.

But she did know that $30,000 had been removed from their checking account — the purchase price of the sailboat, according to an incident report from the Volusia Sheriff's Office.

Amber Grimes told the sheriff’s office on Dec. 6 that she had not heard from her husband in more than a two months. And she said she did not know where he was.

Grimes said she was looking for him as well: to serve him “civil papers.”

Those are among the details revealed in this seafaring saga gone wrong. Chitwood said in a Facebook post last week that the sheriff’s office issued a nationwide arrest warrant for Michael Grimes, 49, for felony littering.

It began about 3 a.m. Nov. 13 when Michael Grimes was trying to navigate into Ponce Inlet in stormy weather and rough seas “when he grounded the sailboat” on New Smyrna Beach, according to the report.

Michael Grimes notified the Coast Guard which was unable to remove the sailboat and told him to contact a salvage company.

Grimes contacted Sea Tow, which turned over a recording of Grimes’ phone call to the sheriff’s office. Sea Tow told Grimes it would cost about $15,000 to remove the sailboat.

Grimes “told them the vessel was not worth that much so he wouldn’t pay for removal,”  the report stated.

And the sailboat has remained stuck on the sand since then near the Drum Avenue walkover.

The sheriff’s office learned about the sailboat on Nov. 16. They traced its registration to a Robert Tarrant, who said he had recently sold the boat to a Richard Mora. Mora told the sheriff’s office he had recently sold the boat to Grimes for $30,000. Mora produced a copy of the bill of sale and of a cashier’s check dated Oct. 26 for the full amount.

The sheriff’s office went to the Springhill Suites by Marriott where the Coast Guard told them Michael Grimes was staying. At the hotel, deputies were told Grimes had checked out Nov. 14, the report stated. The hotel provided video of Michael Grimes in the lobby the morning before. The hotel is about 6 miles away from the grounded sailboat, the report stated.

The sheriff’s office contacted Amber Grimes again on Jan. 4. She told them that she still had not “spoken directly” to her husband and did not know where he was. She said he might be in Orlando.

The report also states that “Grimes had no intention of returning to the sailboat, nor any intention of coordinating the sailboat’s removal from the beach.”

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Deputies, wife search for man who abandoned sailboat in NSB