A Northeast Georgia family’s desperation is growing as they enter the second month without any contact with their missing father.
It’s now been over a month since Joanie Callenback Knight last saw Vaughn Callenback. The 77-year-old Rabun County man visited Knight at her home in Franklin County, North Carolina, on July 3. She says he borrowed some money and left her house on July 4.
Callenback was last seen on July 5 at United Community Bank in Clayton, depositing the money his daughter gave him and a check from a metal recycling company from Toccoa.
Truck found
Callenback’s truck was located two days later over an embankment on Old Coleman River Road in Rabun County. According to the Rabun County Emergency Management Agency, the Rabun County Sheriff’s Office had the truck towed from the scene. Knight says she was unaware the truck was found until days later.
On July 13, Knight’s sister spoke with their stepbrother and learned he had not seen their father in almost a week. Payne filed a missing person’s report, and Rabun County EMA launched what it described in a news release as a “hasty search” around where the vehicle was recovered.
It was at that time that Knight says the family learned his truck had been towed.
According to the distraught daughter, the sheriff’s office never contacted the family about the truck being found. She says they considered the truck “abandoned” since they didn’t find anyone near or in the vehicle.
Knight also says that when the sheriff’s office towed the truck on July 7 they made not attempt – at least to her knowledge – to get in touch with her father as owner of the truck.
Knight has been frustrated the last few weeks with how she believes the Rabun County Sheriff’s Office has mishandled her dad’s missing person’s case. She says the sheriff’s office didn’t take any fingerprints from the truck before it was towed and claims authorities only searched for a few days before calling it off.
Once the search for her father was called off, Knight contacted the Georgia Bureau of Investigations for assistance.
Due diligence
In response to allegations that local authorities had mishandled the case, Rabun County EMA Director Brian Panell issued a page-long press release on July 26 outlining every step taken to find Callenback. Panell says after that hasty search, they returned to where the truck was found on July 14.
“These searches continued over a period of six days following the initial search operation,” he says. “Professional, dedicated volunteers with a wide variety of experience returned to the area and performed diligent and thorough search efforts in hopes of locating the missing male.”
Despite the searches and resources devoted to finding her father – ten K-9s, drones, and Search and Rescue teams covering over 220 miles on ATVs and motorcycles – Knight believes deputies failed to do their due diligence the day they found and towed her father’s truck.
She tells Now Habersham she feels that, once they ran the tag and found out her father was an elderly man, “at the very least, a welfare check should have been done.”
Knight describes her father as a typical “mountain man” who stayed to himself and did his own thing. He would collect cans to take to the recycling center or go off to a favorite fishing hole. She said he “didn’t bother anybody.” She misses their weekly visits when her dad would come to her house for dinner and weekends spent with him and her children at his Rabun County home.
No answer
Rabun County Sheriff’s Office (RCSO) Lieutenant Mark Gerrells II tells Now Habersham the sheriff’s office requested the GBI’s assistance. He says the agency has been actively involved in the investigation since July 17.
According to Gerrells, the initial incident report taken when the truck was found on July 7 states the deputy did not observe any evidence suggesting the vehicle was involved in an accident. Instead, it appeared that the vehicle was parked on the side of the road and may not have been in gear.
He says the reporting deputy ran the tag through dispatch but there was no phone number associated with the vehicle’s registration. However, the deputy ran the registered owner’s name and retrieved a phone number. Gerrells says the deputy called the number but never got an answer.
No sign of foul play
In all, according to Panell and Rabun County EMA, 77 people devoted more than 119 man-hours to searching for Callenback over seven days. Those searchers came from across Georgia and two South Carolina agencies. They conducted ground and aerial searches in the area around Old Coleman River Road west of Clayton.
The steep terrain and natural hazards of the area bordering the Chattahoochee National Forest made the search hazardous. However, Gerrells says anyone is welcome to conduct searches in the area if they choose.
For now, he says the sheriff’s office and GBI are continuing to follow up on leads provided by the public.
According to Gerrells, there is no evidence at this time to indicate that foul play is involved in Callenback’s disappearance. However, it is still an active and ongoing investigation.
Anyone with information about this case is asked to contact the Rabun County Sheriff’s Office at 706-782-3612.
