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Breaking news, sons of couple assumed killed by escaped prisoners hold out hope they’re alive despite signs of struggle on stolen yacht.

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The family of a Virginia couple assumed killed in the Caribbean by three escaped prisoners is still holding out hope they’ll be found alive — despite seeing evidence of a violent struggle on their stolen yacht.

Ralph Hendry, 66, and his wife, Kathy Brandel, 71, were last seen in Grenada on Feb. 18 as they headed to a restaurant from the boat they live in, Simplicity, which was found “anchored and abandoned” on St. Vincent and the Grenadines a few days later, according to the Salty Dawg Sailing Association.

“The boat itself was ransacked and everything was strewn about in the entire cabin,” Brandel’s son, Nick Buro, told CNN .

“So clearly there was an altercation of some type that took place on the boat which does indicate that we are concerned for their safety overall because it does appear that they were likely injured,” Buro said.

Buro said he and his brother, Bryan Hendry, are “doing our best to try and get answers to find out what is next in terms of hopefully finding them safely recovered somewhere on the islands.”

“But of course from the evidence that’s been found on the boat, we are concerned that there might be a possibility that they aren’t with us.”

The couple arrived on the island two weeks prior, planning to stay another week before they went missing the same day Ron Mitchell, 30, Trevon Robertson, 19, and Abita Stanislaus, 25, escaped the South St. George Police Station, officials said.

The escapees then made their way to the marina, where they fled to the other island, where they were subsequently captured.

The Royal Grenada Police Force has said that all evidence points to the couple having been “killed in the process.”

The men were each charged a couple of months ago with one count of robbery with violence. Mitchell, a sailor, also faces one count of rape, three counts of attempted rape, two counts of indecent assault and causing harm.

Buro said that “as far as we know three suspects are allegedly connected with this horrific event are in custody with the St. Vincent police and are being questioned.”

He said his mom and her partner are experienced sailors who sold their home years ago to buy the yacht.

“It was their home. Everything they had, they owned, was on that boat. It was their life,” Buro told CNN.

“Kathy worked her whole life and then retired. Ralph worked in financial services and continued to work from the boat. But really what they did was sell their home, sell their possessions, and bought a boat and choose a lifestyle that most of us would never imagine could be done,” he said.

“And they loved every minute of it and they saw many parts of the world and just lived a life of joy and love,” the son added.

The Salty Dawg Sailing Association paid tribute to the couple.

“Kathy Brandel and Ralph Hendry are veteran cruisers and long-time members of the Salty Dawg Sailing Association from its earliest days. Warm-hearted and capable, they both contributed to building the SDSA and Kathy sat on the association’s board for two years,” it said in a release.

The club also shared a statement from the couple’s family.

“We want to reach out to the entire cruiser community to express our gratitude for everyone that worked to gather information from eyewitnesses and provide search and rescue support,” said Buro and Hendry’s son, Bryan Hendry.

“It means so much to us that so many people cared for Ralph and Kathy as friends and fellow cruisers that they are willing to stop and help in whatever way possible,” they said in the statement.

The couple have been married for 27 years and have spent more than a decade sailing around the globe, NBC Washington reported .

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“They loved immersing themselves in different cultures and meeting people and spreading their love wherever they could,” Bryan told the outlet.

“You’ll never meet more beautiful people than Kathy and Ralph. They made everybody feel happy and so welcome. They consistently made you feel like you were part of their family,” Buro told NBC station.

Bob Osborn, president of the Salty Dawg Sailing Association, has offered condolences to the families. “This is a very upsetting event and details are still unconfirmed by the authorities, but this does appear to be a tragic event – our hopes and prayers are with Ralph and Kathy and the family who love them,” he said in a statement.

“I have spoken to the families and have offered our deepest condolences and our assistance in any way possible. In all my years of cruising the Caribbean, I have never heard of anything like this,” he added.

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Man Sentenced to Death for Throwing Couple Off Yacht

By cathy franklin • published april 10, 2009 • updated on january 7, 2010 at 2:48 pm.

Calling the crimes "cold and vicious," a judge Friday sentenced a Long Beach man to death for murdering three people, including a couple who were tied to an anchor and thrown overboard in a plot to steal their yacht.

Jurors recommended the death penalty on Nov. 6 for Skylar Deleon, who masterminded the slayings of Thomas Hawks, 57, and Jackie Hawks, 47, who were trying to sell their boat -- the Well Deserved -- when they took Deleon and two other men out for a trial run on Nov. 15, 2004.

Deleon, 29, was convicted Oct. 20 of killing the Hawkses. The bodies of the former Prescott, Ariz., couple have never been recovered.

The same panel convicted Deleon of slashing the throat of Anaheim resident Jon Jarvi, 45, who had turned over $50,000 to Deleon in November 2003 for what was to be a no-lose deal. His body was found near a road outside of Ensenada, Mexico.

In denying a defense motion to reduce the sentence to life in prison without parole, Orange County Superior Court Judge Frank Fasel made a number of findings, including that "this cold and vicious murder was committed for financial gain."

Murder for financial gain was one of two special circumstance allegations -- the other was multiple murder -- that made Deleon eligible for the death penalty.

Fasel said he had considered both aggravating and mitigating factors in reaching his decision. "However, the horrors of these three murders themselves are more aggravating," he said.

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"The mental anguish and torment these three people must have experienced while bound and in anticipation of their fate warrants death instead of life without parole."

Fasel also imposed several finds and restitution orders, including $55,500 for Betty Jarvi, the mother of Jon Jarvi.

Prosecutors said Tom and Jackie Hawks had lived about three years on their 55-foot trawler, traveling up and down the Mexican coast, until deciding to sell it when his son and daughter-in-law had a baby. The couple wanted to be closer to their new grandson.

Tom Hawks, a retired probation officer who decided to sell the boat without a broker, took out ads and Deleon responded.

Deleon, who as a child actor had a non-speaking role in several episodes of the "Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers" television series, came across as a man who, despite his young age, had the wherewithal to pay the more than $400,000 the Hawkses were asking, prosecutors said.

To further put the Hawkses at ease, Deleon brought his pregnant then-wife, Jennifer, and their 18-month-old daughter for a look at the boat, and asked the owners to arrange a test run on the open sea, said Senior Deputy District Attorney Matt Murphy.

According to evidence presented at trial, including the testimony of one of his accomplices, Deleon was accompanied by Alonso Machain and John Fitzgerald Kennedy, who was introduced as an accountant but is a member of a Long Beach street gang.

Machain testified that he stayed with Jackie Hawks while Kennedy and Deleon overpowered her husband, forced both to sign transfer and power of attorney documents, then brought them both on the deck. They were tied back-to-back to an anchor and thrown overboard.

On the way back, the three divided $3,600 that was on the boat and Kennedy -- who was convicted of first-degree murder in the slayings of the Hawkses and also faces the death penalty -- fished on the way back to Newport Beach, prosecutors said.

Jim Hawks, a retired police chief, said he will never get over the death of his brother.

"I'll spend the rest of my life dealing with grief and spend the rest of my life dealing with the anger and hatred toward the defendant," he said.

Ryan Hawks, son of Tom Hawks and stepson of Jackie Hawks, said his family's values have taken on new meaning for him.

"I know my parents, they believed in the justice system," he said. "I abide by it more than ever. I embrace it."

Deleon, wearing an orange jail jumpsuit with his wrists chained to a set of waist chains, declined to make a statement.

In his statement to the judge, Jeff Jarvi said the way his brother and the Hawkses died makes him wake up at night. He imagines his brother, "crying, crawling on the desert floor to a highway, remembering that last face (he) saw."

"It doesn't go away," Jarvi said. "It continues like a roller-coaster that never ends."

During his client's trial, defense attorney Gary Pohlson told jurors upfront that Deleon was guilty, although the seven-woman, five-man panel was still called upon to deliver verdicts on the charges.

Pohlson had hoped to persuade the jury to chose the alternate punishment of life in prison without parole, the same sentence that Deleon's former wife, who has gone back to using her maiden name, Jennifer Henderson, is serving. She was sentenced to two life-without-parole sentences for her role in the conspiracy.

Deleon and Henderson's young children are being raised by her parents.

During his statement to the court, Ryan Hawks indicated that Deleon would be denied visitation with his children, who are now 4 and 5 years old.

Murphy said outside the courtroom that no such order is in effect, but that the grandparents agree. "I don't think the Hendersons will ever let that (visitation) happen," he said.

During the penalty phase of trial, Pohlson argued that Deleon was not only physically and emotionally abused by his father, but so criminally indoctrinated by the man -- who had served a federal prison term for drug dealing -- that he turned to him for help in luring the Hawkses out to sea.

But jurors said that argument was not enough the return the less severe verdict.

A May 1 sentencing date is set for Kennedy, 43. He was not charged in the Jarvi slaying.

Two others were charged in the conspiracy. Myron Gardner, 45, of Long Beach, who solicited Kennedy to take part in the plot, pleaded guilty in March to being an accessory after the fact and was sentenced to 365 days in jail, which he has served.

Machain, who testified against Deleon, is due back in court in May. Murphy said he expected Machain, 25, of Pico Rivera, to be sentenced to about 20 years in prison, even with his cooperation, because he played an active role in the crime.

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Former 'Power Rangers' Actor Sentenced to Death in Yacht Killings

SANTA ANA, Calif. – A judge sentenced a onetime child actor to death for murdering an Arizona couple by tying them to an anchor and throwing them overboard from their yacht off Southern California.

Orange County Superior Court Judge Frank F. Fasel on Friday imposed the sentence recommended by the jury that convicted 29-year old Skylar Deleon of killing Tom and Jackie Hawks of Prescott, Ariz.

Click here for photos.

Prosecutors say the Long Beach man and a teen actor in a "Power Rangers" TV series feigned interest in buying the couple's yacht and killed them during a test cruise in 2004.

Deleon overpowered them on a test cruise, tied them to an anchor and tossed them into the Pacific Ocean as they begged for their lives, according to the prosecution.

After the yacht killings, the prosecution said, Deleon and his then-wife Jennifer Henderson scrubbed the boat clean with bleach wipes in Newport Harbor.

The Hawks' bodies were never found.

Three others also were convicted of related charges.

Deleon was also convicted in the 2003 killing of Jon Jarvi, an Anaheim man he met on a work furlough program.

The defense had pleaded with jurors to help spare his client's life, arguing Deleon was abused by a drug dealing father and abandoned by his mother, leaving him predisposed to violence.

Deleon's attorneys were upfront about his guilt in the murders from the beginning of the trial, hoping to maintain his credibility when he asked them to recommend a sentence of life in prison without parole.

Deleon's former wife Henderson was convicted in 2006 of murder and murder for financial gain in the Hawks' deaths and was sentenced to two terms of life in prison without parole.

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Who Owns Which Superyacht? (A Complete Guide)

Have you ever wondered who owns the most luxurious, extravagant, and expensive superyachts? Or how much these lavish vessels are worth? In this complete guide, we’ll explore who owns these magnificent vessels, what amenities they hold, and the cost of these incredible yachts.

We’ll also take a look at some of the most expensive superyachts in the world and the notable people behind them.

Get ready to explore the world of superyachts and the people who own them!

Table of Contents

Short Answer

The ownership of superyachts is generally private, so the exact answer to who owns which superyacht is not always publicly available.

However, there are some notable superyacht owners that are known.

For example, Larry Ellison, the co-founder of Oracle, owns the Rising Sun, which is the 11th largest superyacht in the world.

Other notable owners include Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen.

Overview of Superyachts

The term superyacht refers to a large, expensive recreational boat that is typically owned by the worlds wealthy elite.

These vessels are designed for luxury cruising and typically range in size from 24 meters to over 150 meters, with some even larger.

Superyachts usually feature extensive amenities and creature comforts, such as swimming pools, outdoor bars, movie theaters, helipads, and spas.

Superyachts can range in price from $30 million to an astonishingly high $400 million.

Like most luxury items, the ownership of a superyacht is a status symbol for those who can afford it.

The list of superyacht owners reads like a whos who of billionaires, with names like Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

The most expensive superyacht in the world is owned by the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.

While some superyacht owners prefer to keep their vessels out of the public eye, others have made headlines with their extravagant amenities.

Some of the most famous superyachts feature swimming pools, private beaches, helicopter pads, on-board cinemas, and luxurious spas.

In conclusion, owning a superyacht is an exclusive status symbol for the world’s wealthy elite.

These vessels come with hefty price tags that can range from $30 million to over $400 million, and feature some of the most luxurious amenities imaginable.

Notable owners include the Emir of Qatar, Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

Who are the Owners of Superyachts?

From Hollywood celebrities to tech billionaires, superyacht owners come from all walks of life.

Many of the most well-known owners are billionaires, including Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

Other notable owners include Hollywood stars such as Leonardo DiCaprio and Johnny Depp.

However, not all superyacht owners are wealthy.

Many are everyday people who have worked hard and saved up to purchase their dream vessel.

Other notable billionaire owners include Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, and former US President Donald Trump.

These luxurious vessels come with hefty price tags that can range from $30 million to over $400 million.

For many superyacht owners, their vessels serve as a status symbol of wealth and luxury.

Some owners prefer to keep their yachts out of the public eye, while others have made headlines with their extensive amenities – from swimming pools and helicopter pads to on-board cinemas and spas.

Many of these yachts are designed to the owner’s exact specifications, ensuring that each one is totally unique and reflects the owner’s individual tastes and personality.

Owning a superyacht is an exclusive club, reserved for those with the means and the desire to experience the ultimate in luxury.

Whether they are billionaires or everyday people, superyacht owners are all united in their love of the sea and their appreciation for the finer things in life.

The Most Expensive Superyacht in the World

When it comes to superyachts, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the Emir of Qatar, certainly knows how to make a statement.

His luxury vessel, the 463-foot Al Mirqab, holds the title of the world’s most expensive superyacht.

Built in 2008 by German shipbuilder Peters Werft, this impressive yacht is complete with 10 luxurious cabins, a conference room, cinema, and all the amenities one would expect from a vessel of this magnitude.

In addition, the Al Mirqab features a helipad, swimming pool, and even an outdoor Jacuzzi.

With a price tag of over $400 million, the Al Mirqab is one of the most expensive yachts in the world.

In addition to the Emir of Qatar, there are several other notable owners of superyachts.

Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos all own luxurious vessels.

Bezos yacht, the aptly named The Flying Fox, is one of the longest superyachts in the world at a staggering 414 feet in length.

The Flying Fox also comes with a host of amenities, such as a helipad, swimming pool, spa, and multiple outdoor entertaining areas.

Bezos also reportedly spent over $400 million on the vessel.

Other notable owners of superyachts include Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, who owns the $200 million Kingdom 5KR, and Oracle founder Larry Ellison, who owns the $200 million Rising Sun.

There are also many lesser-known owners, such as hedge-fund manager Ken Griffin, who owns the $150 million Aviva, and investor Sir Philip Green, who owns the $100 million Lionheart.

No matter who owns them, superyachts are sure to turn heads.

With their impressive size, luxurious amenities, and hefty price tags, these vessels have become a symbol of wealth and prestige.

Whether its the Emir of Qatar or a lesser-known owner, the worlds superyacht owners are sure to make a statement.

Notable Superyacht Owners

When it comes to the wealthiest and most luxurious owners of superyachts, the list reads like a whos who of the worlds billionaires.

At the top of the list is the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, who holds the distinction of owning the most expensive superyacht in the world.

Aside from the Emir, other notable owners include Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

All of these owners have made headlines with their extravagant vessels, which are typically priced between $30 million and $400 million.

The amenities that come with these vessels vary greatly from owner to owner, but they almost always include luxurious swimming pools, helicopter pads, on-board cinemas, and spas.

Some owners opt for more extravagant features, such as submarines, personal submarines, and even their own personal submarines! Other owners prefer to keep their vessels out of the public eye, but for those who prefer a more showy approach, they can certainly make a statement with a superyacht.

No matter who owns the vessel, it’s no surprise that these superyachts are a status symbol among the world’s wealthiest.

Whether you’re trying to impress your peers or just looking to enjoy a luxurious outing, owning a superyacht is the ultimate way to show off your wealth.

What Amenities are Included on Superyachts?

Owning a superyacht is a sign of wealth and prestige, and many of the worlds most prominent billionaires have their own vessels.

The most expensive superyacht in the world is owned by the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, while other notable owners include Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

The cost of a superyacht can range from $30 million to over $400 million, but the price tag doesnt quite capture the sheer extravagance and amenities of these vessels.

Superyachts come with all the comforts of home, and then some.

Many owners will equip their vessels with swimming pools, helicopter pads, on-board cinemas, spas, and other luxury amenities.

The interior of a superyacht can be custom-designed to the owners specifications.

Some owners opt for modern, sleek designs, while others prefer a more traditional look.

Many of the most luxurious yachts feature marble floors, walk-in closets, and custom-made furniture.

Some vessels even come with a full-service gym, complete with exercise equipment and trained professionals.

Other amenities may include a library, casino, media room, and private bar.

When it comes to outdoor amenities, superyachts have some of the most impressive features in the world.

Many yachts come with outdoor entertainment areas, complete with full kitchens, dining rooms, and lounge areas.

Some owners even opt for hot tubs or jacuzzis for relaxing afternoons in the sun.

And, of course, there are the jet skis, water slides, and other exciting water activities that come with many of these vessels.

No matter what amenities a superyacht has, it is sure to be an experience like no other.

From the sleek interiors to the luxurious outdoor features, these vessels provide a unique, luxurious experience that is unrivaled on land.

Whether you’re looking for a relaxing escape or an exciting adventure, a superyacht is sure to provide.

How Much Do Superyachts Cost?

When it comes to superyachts, the sky is the limit when it comes to cost.

These luxury vessels come with hefty price tags that can range from anywhere between $30 million to over $400 million.

So, if youre in the market for a superyacht, youre looking at an investment that could easily break the bank.

The cost of a superyacht is driven by a variety of factors, including size, amenities, and customization.

Generally, the larger the yacht, the more expensive it will be.

Superyachts typically range in size from 100 feet to over 200 feet, and they can be as wide as 40 feet.

The bigger the yacht, the more luxurious features and amenities it will have.

Amenities also play a significant role in the cost of a superyacht.

While some owners prefer to keep their yachts out of the public eye, others have made headlines with their extensive amenities.

From swimming pools and helicopter pads to on-board cinemas and spas, the sky is the limit when it comes to customizing a superyacht.

The more amenities a superyacht has, the more expensive it will be.

Finally, customization is another major factor that will drive up the cost of a superyacht.

Many luxury vessels have custom-designed interiors that are tailored to the owners tastes.

From custom furniture and artwork to lighting and audio systems, the cost of a superyacht can quickly escalate depending on the level of customization.

In short, the cost of a superyacht can vary widely depending on its size, amenities, and customization.

While some may be able to get away with spending a few million dollars, others may end up spending hundreds of millions of dollars on their dream yacht.

No matter what your budget is, its important to do your research and find out exactly what youre getting for your money before signing on the dotted line.

Keeping Superyachts Out of the Public Eye

When it comes to owning a superyacht, some owners prefer to keep their vessels out of the public eye.

Understandably, these individuals are concerned with privacy and discretion, and therefore tend to take measures to ensure their yachts are not visible to outsiders.

For instance, some superyacht owners opt to keep their vessels in private marinas, away from the public areas of larger ports.

Additionally, some yacht owners may choose to hire security guards to patrol and protect their vessels while they are moored or sailing.

In addition to physical security, some superyacht owners also use technology to keep their vessels out of the public eye.

For example, a yacht owner may choose to install a satellite-based communications system that allows them to keep their vessel completely off-radar.

This system works by bouncing signals off satellites rather than transmitting them, making it virtually impossible for anyone to track the yachts movements.

Finally, some superyacht owners also choose to limit the number of people who have access to their vessels.

For instance, the owner may only allow family members and close friends to board the yacht.

Additionally, the owner may choose to employ a limited number of staff to help maintain the vessel and keep it running smoothly.

These individuals may be required to sign non-disclosure agreements to ensure they do not disclose any information about the yacht or its owner.

Overall, while some superyacht owners may choose to keep their vessels out of the public eye, there are still plenty of other ways to show off the opulence associated with owning a superyacht.

From swimming pools and helicopter pads to on-board cinemas and spas, there are many luxurious amenities that can make a superyacht the envy of any jet setter.

Final Thoughts

Superyachts are a symbol of luxury and status, and the list of yacht owners reads like a who’s who of billionaires.

From the Emir of Qatar’s world-record breaking $400 million yacht to Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen’s vessel with a helicopter pad and on-board spa, the amenities of these luxury vessels are truly stunning.

With prices ranging from $30 million to over $400 million, owning a superyacht is an expensive endeavor.

Whether you’re looking to purchase one or just curious to learn more about the owners and their amenities, this guide will provide you with all the information you need to stay up to date with the superyacht scene.

James Frami

At the age of 15, he and four other friends from his neighborhood constructed their first boat. He has been sailing for almost 30 years and has a wealth of knowledge that he wants to share with others.

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The Final Voyage: Retired California couple chained to anchor, thrown off their own yacht

04/30/2018 5:44 pm pdt.

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A headline-dominating murder mystery in California. A brutal crime filled with so much greed, deception and pure evil that it will continue to be talked about for years to come.

Thomas and Jackie Hawks were living the life they always dreamed of: sailing the Pacific Ocean for nearly two years on a yacht appropriately named Well Deserved .

"The best example one could ever hope for of how couples should treat each other," said Carter Ford, a friend of the Hawks. "They were just totally devoted."

The loving couple had worked hard their entire lives, Tom as a probation officer and Jackie as a stepmom to Tom's two sons. And when they retired, they bought their dream boat, the Well Deserved , a 55-foot yacht. Life couldn't have been better on board.

"They personally were precious people to talk with," said friend Judy Weightman.

Weightman and Ford moored their boats near the Hawks in the same upscale harbor in ritzy Newport Beach, California.

"They lived on the boat better than most people can live in a house," said Ford.

The Hawks cruised the most exotic ports of call from California to the Mexican Riviera. Little did Tom and Jackie know they would soon be headed into troubled waters and a dangerous transition they never saw coming.

After two years of endless vacations, Tom and Jackie's dream is suddenly interrupted in the most wonderful way.

"They had a new grandbaby in Arizona," said author Caitlin Rother.

Crime writer Caitlin Rother says Tom and Jackie decided to embark on a new journey.

"They wanted to get back to Arizona and spend time with this little boy," said Rother.

Tom and Jackie put their beloved Well Deserved up for sale. Instead of paying a hefty commission to a boat broker, they were going to sell the yacht themselves.

"For Tom and Jackie the savings of that fee was going to be significant with what they were going to have left, so they advertised in boating magazines," said Carter Ford.

The Hawks place a small ad in Yachting World magazine, asking $435,000 for the meticulously maintained Well Deserved.

Now all they needed was a legitimate buyer. And it didn't take long.

"They got interest from a buyer for the Well Deserved ," said Caitlin Rother. "This buyer though was young, 25 years old."

The buyer tells Tom he has cash -- lots of it.

"This guy said he had made money as a child actor and made some money in real estate," said Rother.

Initially Tom, the former probation officer is skeptical. But then the buyer does something that eases both Tom and Jackie's fears.

"He brought his wife, and his wife was pregnant, and she brought their little baby daughter in a stroller and that made Jackie and Tom trust them," said Rother.

The Hawks accept an all-cash offer for their asking price of $435,000, and an additional $15,000 for some personal items. Tom and Jackie celebrate their financial windfall with one last trip on board the Well Deserved .

But before the deal is officially sealed, the buyer calls with one more request: a sea trial to inspect the hull and to test the motors.

"The idea is to take the boat out on a sea trial and then they're going to come back and finish the deal," said Rother.

Tom and Jackie expect the buyer and his wife to show up. But this time he has a different crew.

"The buyer comes with a young guy, skinny guy and a much bigger guy, who he says is his accountant," said Rother.

The Hawks are a little suspicious, but agree, and cautiously navigate their way out of Newport Harbor and into open waters for one final voyage on the Well Deserved .

Carter Ford says he made plans to meet up with the Hawks later that night. But as darkness descended over Newport Harbor, he got a troubling message from Jackie.

"'Hey Carter, we don't know why we're not back at shore yet, we're still out here on the sea trial.' We really don't know what's happening other than the fact that they're telling us that there still sea-trialing the boat," said Ford.

Jackie says they'll let him know when they get back to the harbor. But they never called.

When the sun rises, the Well Deserved is moored back in Newport Harbor, but Tom and Jackie are nowhere to be found.

"When they never turned up, it sends chills up your back, of course," said Ford.

The 55-foot yacht is moored back in Newport Harbor, but the Hawks seemed to have vanished into the ocean air.

"They're not calling their friends, they're not calling their family, they're not answering their cellphones, and you know something's wrong," said author Caitlin Rother.

Rother says Tom and Jackie's SUV was also missing, so initially friends assumed the Hawks took a road trip to celebrate their financial windfall.

But when the Hawks failed to contact anyone for more than a week, the family asks Carter Ford to cruise out to the Well Deserved and dig around a little. And when Ford steps onboard the normally meticulously kept yacht, his heart sinks.

What first alerted you that something was wrong with the boat?

"The way it was left, not only was the boat sloppy, there was a white towel hanging out the port hole on the side," said Ford. "This does not look good."

The family immediately files a missing-persons report.

"When I first got the call, I had one of the detectives, I said 'Head out to the yacht, see what you can see,'" said retired Newport Beach Police Detective David Byington.

Retired Detective Sgt. Byington says the detective smashed the lock on the cabin door and entered with caution.

"There wasn't any signs of violence," said Byington.

They find that white towel and a fresh inkpad wedged between the master bed and a wall. Then something else stops him dead in his tracks: a receipt.

"And on this receipt were bleach, cleaning supplies, heavy-duty trash bags and Tums," said Byington. "Just something in the back of my head said 'Well, if I was going to commit a murder, that would be my 'clean kit.' I'd get bags to destroy evidence, clean up and down with bleach wipes, and maybe my stomach would be upset so I would take some Tums."

Newport Police now want to know who was buying the Well Deserved.

"So the buyers were this young couple, Skylar Deleon, 25 years old, and his wife, Jennifer. Jennifer's pregnant and they have a little baby daughter," said Caitlin Rother.

Skylar Deleon may look familiar: he's a former child actor appearing on the "Mighty Morphin Power Rangers" TV show. His wife Jennifer, the daughter of Christian evangelical parents, worked as a hairdresser.

"He wanted to get the boat with his wife to live on and charter and so have a business on the boat and take families out fishing," said Rother.

With still no sign of the Hawks, Byington secretly puts a surveillance team on the Deleons.

Undercover officer David Moon tracks them down at a local church, but they aren't there to pray. They're actually cleaning the church.

"We show up at a church and he's volunteering his time there with his wife and baby," said Byington.

"We'd also followed Jennifer, she was a hairdresser, and to her job, and she was just walking in, cutting hair," said Newport Beach Police Officer David Moon. "They looked pretty normal. Just a young couple doing their thing.

"I'm expecting to see, you know, some bad guys that you'd get from Hollywood casting. This wasn't it. This was this husband and wife volunteering their time at a church, cleaning," said Byington.

Skylar Deleon and his wife are regulars at church, but they're not volunteering much to help police find the Hawks.

Detectives uncover that Skylar was on probation after being busted for burglary. And when they dig into their finances, they find the couple is $87,000 in debt, living in Jennifer's parents' garage.

Cops start to wonder where in the world did they get the money to buy the Well Deserved ? It certainly wasn't from Deleon's acting career.

"Skylar Deleon had told people that he had been on 'Mighty Morpin Power Rangers,' but in fact it turned out he had just had two minor non-speaking roles," said Caitlin Rother.

Detective Byington hauls Skylar in for questioning, and in the recorded interrogation, Skylar adamantly maintains they did in fact buy the Well Deserved .

"We spent like 485 on it."

"And that was cash, right? That you paid them that day?"

"I go 'How is it that you have this money that you could buy this yacht?' And he said, he almost dropped his shoulders, and said 'I have to be honest with you, the money I got was from drug sales,'" Byington tells Crime Watch Daily.

Skylar says he gave Tom Hawks a briefcase filled with mostly one hundred dollar bills he'd laundered out of Mexico; he handed over the dirty money, and Tom and Jackie signed over the Well Deserved .

"Did he seem nervous?"

"He was excited but nervous. He was just like 'Let's just close this up.'"

"Was it in the trunk so you're out of view, or was it just on the back of the trunk?"

"We were out of view."

Skylar tells Byington the Hawks then asked him if he would use his connections to help the couple open up a bank account in Mexico so they could buy a house.

"He was saying that him and his wife, they were looking at places in San Carlos."

"Did he say anything specific regarding that? 'Cause that's what we're trying to focus looking for them."

"He just said that they liked the Sea of Cortez."

Skylar takes his story one step further, telling Detective Byington that Tom and Jackie even signed a power of attorney giving him full access to move all of their money to Mexico.

"You're telling me you got these two power of attorneys specifically for that, you didn't embellish it any other way. Nothing like that."

As suspicious as it all sounds, the Deleons produce a power of attorney that looks legitimate.

"They hand them over to the police, they are signed, everything looks OK," said Rother.

"Skylar, you have nothing to do with disappearance, wife doesn't either, nobody in your family, your dad. Nobody, right?"

"Even though the story didn't ring true, my first instincts, when I talked to Skylar, was that I don't see him doing anything," said Byington.

Adding to Skylar Deleon's credibility, cellphone towers show the Hawks' phones were "pinging" near the Mexican border the morning after they sea-trialed the boat with Skylar.

Detectives are back at zero, and they turn to the Hawks family for help.

"The Hawks' son Ryan is a really good-looking individual, so we put him in front of the cameras on national news for a plea to find this car and his parents," said Byington.

Cops get the hit they've been waiting for, and it's across the border.

"We finally got a call from an American citizen down in Mexico who said 'Hey, I'm watching the news right now and you say you're looking for a car and I'm looking at it,'" said Byington. "And sure as hell, here's the Hawks' vehicle sitting there."

Thomas and Jackie Hawks did what thousands of people do: They took out an ad to sell their yacht. Little did they know they were setting themselves up for a trap.

Detectives are staring at Tom and Jackie Hawks' missing SUV. It's spotted outside a house near Ensenada, Mexico.

Is this the break Newport Beach Detective Sgt. David Byington has been waiting for? The Hawks mysteriously disappeared more than a month prior, last seen heading out to sea onboard their yacht.

A Mexican federale takes the lead and knocks on the door. Byington speaks very little Spanish, but even he understands what the man says.

"The gentleman inside the house said the name Skylar Deleon," said Byington.

The same Skylar Deleon who bought the Well Deserved , and he wasn't alone.

"And then I hear the same Mexican gentleman inside say Jennifer's name," said Byington.

The gentleman at the door is an old surfing buddy, and says Skylar gave him the car. After that, Deleon's very pregnant wife Jennifer picked him up and drove him back to the States.

"He swabbed the knobs within the car and end up hitting Skylar's DNA on the heater knob in there, so it turned out to be amazing," said Byington.

Detectives now believe something bad happened to Tom and Jackie on the Well Deserved -- but what?

Orange County Senior Deputy District Attorney Matt Murphy smells big trouble.

"This case was uniquely diabolical," Murphy tells Crime Watch Daily.

Murphy suspects Skylar and possibly his wife Jennifer are both involved in the Hawks' disappearance, but he needs proof.

So he circles back to that power of attorney. Skylar told detectives the Hawks willingly signed it, hoping Skylar Deleon could help them buy a home in Mexico.

"They had a durable power of attorney, OK. That makes no sense," said Murphy. "That would give this young 22, 23-year-old couple, strangers to them still, access to their bank accounts."

Here's the problem: the notary, a woman named Kathleen Harris, tells cops it's the real deal, claiming she witnessed the Hawks signing the papers and personally took the required fingerprints to make the documents legal.

"She said, 'I was down there, I saw the transaction. I didn't see how much money was in the suitcase,' but she tells the same story essentially that Skylar told. They also had fingerprints all over the documents," said Murphy.

But when cops ask the notary to physically describe Tom and Jackie Hawks, she stumbles.

"She describes Tom to a tee, but she described Jackie as having brown curly hair, which was odd because Jackie, when they moved onto the Well Deserved , she cut her long curly hair and she spiked it and dyed it blonde. So that was one of those things, it didn't quite make sense."

Could the notary just be confused? The fingerprints on the power of attorney are an exact match, and the signatures also appear to be legitimate.

"We send these things off to the FBI and the finest handwriting experts in the world look at it and go, 'That is Tom's signature,'" said Murphy.

The experts also confirm it's Jackie's signature -- but there is something strange.

"Their last name is Hawks with an 's,' OK, and she wrote 'Jackie Hawk,' and somebody else came in later and wrote in an 's' that's inconsistent with her signature," said Murphy.

Murphy believes Jackie may have been secretly trying to alert someone they were in deep trouble.

"She wanted to send a signal to somebody in the future that something here is not right," said Murphy.

And just as Murphy is about turn the spotlight on the Deleons, the D.A. gets tipped off that Skylar is about to scramble like a cockroach looking for cover.

"Suddenly Skylar contacts his probation officer and says 'Can I get permission to leave the country?'" said Caitlin Rother.

So the quick-thinking D.A. comes up with a plan, and it's all caught on audio tape. An arrest warrant is issued for Skylar Deleon for money-laundering. During Skylar's interrogation, he confessed to laundering money from a Mexican drug deal.

As the officer moves in to cuff Skylar, he is reportedly wearing an adult diaper at the time.

"So they arrest Skylar and Jennifer has the gall to start being angry at the police officers, like 'You have some nerve to take my husband away,' and it was just an unbelievable scene," said Rother.

Detectives also head to that converted garage apartment at Jennifer's parents' place, where the two have been living. Cops hit the jackpot.

"They find all of Tom and Jackie's stuff. They find their camera, they find driver's license and other kinds of very personal belongings," said Rother.

And detectives can't help but notice that in Jackie's driver's license, she looks remarkably similar to how the notary described her.

"So that raised suspicions about the notary, and did the notary actually witness these documents being signed or not," said Rother.

Cops are beginning to suspect there are more people involved with the Hawks' disappearance than just the Deleons.

Detectives also stumble across something else in the garage that raises a few eyebrows.

"One of my detectives found a business card from LAPD and the detective was assigned to as a liaison with Interpol," said Byington.

Newport Police contact the Interpol agent, and when detectives reveal they're investigating Skylar's possible involvement in the disappearance of the Hawks, the agent hits them with a jaw-dropper.

"He says 'That's funny because I was talking to him a year ago because we were looking at him for murder of an American citizen in Mexico," said Byington. "I go, 'They killed the Hawks, because this is no way,' you know, this is too much of a coincidence."

But Mexican federales could never link Skylar Deleon to the murder.

"We have no proof he did anything illegal but its stinks on ice," said Byington.

The noose is quickly tightening around Skylar Deleon in the disappearance of Tom and Jackie Hawks. Cops just need to figure out motive and method.

On a hunch, Murphy calls an old boating buddy he met in Indonesia named "Salty Sam."

"I'm like, 'Hey, man. What should we be looking for on a boat if we're trying to figure out if there was a murder committed?' And without skipping a beat, he said 'Look for missing anchors,'" said Matt Murphy.

Investigators go back to the ad the Hawks had placed in that yachting magazine.

"And in every single photo there were two anchors on the bow," said Murphy.

They rush back out to the harbor to check the Well Deserved . And sure enough:

"On the bow of the boat there's only one anchor, and there should have been two," said Murphy.

"Our working theory was 'Hey, they had him sign the paperwork, they shot them, they threw them overboard,'" said retired Newport Beach detective David Byington.

Cops claim Skylar Deleon is actually a master manipulator. Detectives don't believe Deleon ever intended to buy Tom and Jackie Hawks' yacht. Instead, they say, he hatched a twisted plan to steal it by murdering the Hawks in cold blood, then dumping their bodies into the Pacific Ocean.

"Utterly diabolical," said Orange County Senior Deputy District Attorney Matt Murphy. "He used his kids to get two innocent people to trust him enough that he would go out to sea with them and they'd let their guard down. And that's what happened."

Murphy has Deleon arrested for money-laundering so he can build a case. But it becomes crystal clear Skylar Deleon didn't pull of the elaborate scheme by himself. Authorities believe his pregnant wife Jennifer was his partner in crime who helped him set the trap.

"The entire investigation at that point shifted to her," said Murphy.

Still, Murphy needs solid evidence to prove Jennifer was a willing accomplice. And he finally gets it.

"We actually have video surveillance pictures of them walking up to the teller, and Jennifer's got a grin ear to ear," said Byington. "They came up and said 'We want to get money out for the Hawks, and here's the power of attorney,' and the manager comes over and says 'I know the Hawks and I'm not giving you a dime until we verify this.'"

"Physically, she wasn't on that boat, she was absolutely on that boat in every other way. She's cheerleading the whole time," said Matt Murphy.

It was all the proof Murphy needed to charge Jennifer as an accomplice. But instead he makes Deleon's wife an offer he thinks she can't refuse: immunity. All Jennifer has to do is rat out her husband.

"She's probably about seven months' pregnant, at that point, so she told us to pound sand," said Murphy. "Young love prevailed and she said no."

Murphy then goes back to Kathleen Harris, the notary that he suspects lied about witnessing the Hawks sign the power of attorney documents. But Harris doesn't flinch either.

"Everybody stuck to the same story. So we had to see if there was somebody that would tell us the truth," said Murphy.

And there in black and white is the mistake that will sink the Deleon's story, a name staring prosecutors right the face: A signature on that power of attorney of a man who witnessed the deal going down, Alonso Machain.

"So Alonso was 19 years old at the time, living with his parents, and he's working at the Seal Beach city jail," said Murphy.

Machain worked as a jail guard, and he'd befriended Deleon when he was serving time for burglary.

"They develop this weird sort of friendship. And I mean he wraps Alonso around his finger and gets Alonso to go with him for all these meetings with Tom and Jackie Hawks," said Murphy.

But when cops try to haul Machain in for questioning, he flees to Mexico. Again, Murphy offers up a deal. He can't give Machain complete immunity, but if he returns and tells his side of the story, Murphy will take the death penalty off the table.

"He decided at that point to do the right thing," said Murphy.

Detectives turn on a tape recorder and Alsono Machain tells his story.

"Skylar approaches me with this plan he has. He was going to do something that was going to make some money. So he offers me to help him."

Machain tells detectives there was another man in Deleon's crew that day. Deleon introduced him to the Hawks as his accountant. But he was actually a notorious gang-banger and a convicted killer named John F. Kennedy.

"He'd been to prison before, he was an original founding member of a gang called the Long Beach Insane Crips," said Matt Murphy.

Machain says before he, Deleon and Kennedy board the Well Deserved , Deleon gives them strict orders.

"The plan is that we were supposed to kidnap them and take them out to sea and toss them overboard."

"And how was he planning to do that?"

"Tasers. He thought of Tasers."

Machain says once out to sea, they set their plan in motion. Kennedy pretends to be seasick and goes down below into the cabin.

"Mr. Hawks becomes concerned because John F. Kennedy is not returning, so he goes down, Skylar follows Mr. Hawks down to the lower area and that's when he gets ambushed," said David Byington.

Up on deck, Jackie Hawks hears the commotion.

"She says 'What's going on,' and that's when they were actually holding him down. Then that's when I realized that I had to, you know, hold her."

"Alonso at that point produces a Taser and tasers her," said Murphy.

"I was able to cuff Mrs. Hawks. At this time I walked her down to the bedroom area where Skylar told me to go get some tape from the engine room. He got the tape and he told me to tape their eyes, tape their mouth."

"Jackie Hawks is crying and screaming through the piece of cloth over her mouth, and Alonso says the only thing he can see is Mr. Hawks stroking her hand with his fingers, the handcuffed hands, trying to calm her down, and rightly so, because I know Tom Hawks knows what's going to happen," said Byington.

"They had them one by one go up to the kitchen area where she was first. They had her sign a power of attorney."

"Skylar told them 'I'm going to let you go if you cooperate. If you don't we're going to kill you here,'" said Byington.

Alonso Machain says Deleon then heads to the cockpit and punches coordinates into the GPS to steer straight toward the deepest part of the ocean near Catalina Island.

Jackie and Tom, still cuffed and blindfolded, are led to the deck of the boat.

"Got some rope, got up to the back, tied them together."

Then a sound pierces through the ocean waves, a sound Tom and Jackie have heard hundreds of times.

"At that point Skylar disconnects one of the anchors from the bow of the boat and he drags the chain, so they're inside a fiberglass boat and he's dragging the chain to the back," said Murphy.

"He knows that sound," said Byington. "You don't need vision to know that, 'cause they're blindfolded. That chain's coming down the side."

"And she's begging for her life and she's saying 'I have to see my grandchild one more time. I have to see my grandchild again. I'm too young to die,'" said Murphy. "And Tom was stroking her hand, saying 'It's OK, we're going to be together.' So at that point they know what's going to happen. They're going overboard."

"I didn't believe what I was looking at, just pushed them."

The brand new grandparents were still alive when the 50-pound anchor plummeted to the bottom of the sea, dragging the helpless couple 3,600 feet straight down.

Alonso Machain witnessed the inhumanity, and unbearable cruelty of Skylar Deleon, the twisted mastermind behind the murders.

"Skylar picked up this massive anchor and threw it over the side of the boat, and they have the most horrific death I can imagine, and their bodies were never recovered," said retired detective David Byington.

Machain, who helped Deleon kidnap the Hawks, is now a witness against him, telling investigators after Deleon threw the Hawks overboard, he started getting rid of any sign of the Hawks.

"He collected all of Tom and Jackie's personal photographs and tossed them overboard like they were Frisbees," said Matt Murphy. "Skylar had no remorse at all. Skylar Deleon is a complete psychopath."

Once Deleon got rid of the evidence, Machain tells investigators, Deleon and John Kennedy kicked back and started fishing on the way back to harbor in Newport Beach, California.

"How was Skylar acting maybe while this was happening?"

"He was calm, like it was the most normal thing."

Skylar Deleon, John Kennedy and Alonso Machain are all charged with two counts of first-degree murder. Days later, Jennifer Deleon is still standing by her man, telling a Los Angeles television station her husband is absolutely innocent.

Cops say not only is Skylar guilty, but Jennifer is too. Prosecutors charge Jennifer with two counts of murder, claiming she helped carry out the murders from the shore. The motive clear and simple: the Deleons wanted money.

"She's a witch. She knew that they had no money, and yet she's going out to meet the people that are selling Skylar this yacht, and she's bringing her child," said Byington. "She might as well have tied the anchor to those people and thrown them over too."

Separate juries hear each case, but they all come back with the same verdict: guilty.

Jennifer Deleon is sentenced to life in prison.

Alonso Machain is given leniency and sentenced to 20 years.

John F. Kennedy is sentenced to death for the double murder.

Before Skylar Deleon's trial even begins, he's hit with a third murder rap.

"He not only murdered the Hawks, but he murdered, slit the throat of another American in Mexico a year earlier," said Byington.

Cops say Deleon slit the throat of a man named Jon Jarvi after luring him with a promise of turning an investment of $50,000 into more cash. Prosecutors say there was no deal; the motive for the murder was all for fun.

"They purchased a new car because they wanted something to tool their little brood around in," said Matt Murphy. "And then he made a bunch of internet purchases including a $658 piston-driven sex toy."

Nearly five years after the Hawks were murdered, Skylar Deleon faces trial. He was found guilty and sentenced to death.

"There was another motive, and it was a primary motive, and that was that Skylar Deleon wanted to get gender-reassignment surgery," said crime author Caitlin Rother.

Rother, who wrote the book about the Hawks' grisly murders, titled Dead Reckoning , says Deleon desperately needed $17,000 to pay for surgery to transition.

"He had already put down a $500 deposit on this surgery and had one scheduled for two weeks after the Hawks were murdered, but they didn't have the money," said Rother.

Rother knows Skylar Deleon as well as anyone. She started visiting him in prison while researching her book.

"All Skylar wanted to talk was how he wanted to get rid of his penis," said Rother.

But with no money and thinking there was no chance of making the transition while sitting in a cell, Rother says Skylar made a desperate attempt.

"He tried to cut his penis off in jail with a razor," said Rother.

But now the state of California is paying for Skylar Deleon to transition to a woman. Deleon is currently sitting in the psych ward on death row at San Quentin.

"And Skylar is now living as a woman and wants to be called 'she,'" said Rother.

"It's ridiculous," said Byington. "There are legitimate people out there with transgender issues that work their tails off their whole life, if they are lucky enough to get a surgery. Skylar doesn't deserve that right. Skylar doesn't get to kill people and then get rewarded, and that's kind of the way it feels."

Skylar Deleon and his wife have since divorced while behind bars. Deleon continues to maintain he had nothing to do with the Hawks' deaths and has appealed his conviction.

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One of the Russian yachts the West might seek to seize may already be in Russia, but its owner sits in a Plymouth County jail

Sunseeker 76 , of the type a detained Russian exec bought in 2020.

At just 77 feet long, Moscow resident Vladimir Klyushin's Seven K yacht is just slightly below the lower limit of a "superyacht," which starts around 82 feet, but it would still cut quite the figure in all but the most jaded of ports.

But unlike fellow Russian Abramovich's 456-foot superduperyacht, currently berthed in Barcelona , Klyushin's yacht, a Sunseeker 76 that he bought for nearly $4 million in 2020, might already be in Russian territorial waters - its last reported position was in Sochi, on the Russian Black Sea coast.

Although he is Russian, like many Russians with money to spend, he turned to England for maintaining an expensive asset - the boat is registered in the United Kingdom, not the Russian Federation.

Invoice for the yacht, from federal court filings:

The ship has four cabins - with a fifth space that can be used as a cabin for a crew of three. It can get up to 32 knots.

Still, Klyushin hasn't had any chance to take her out for a spin since last March, when Swiss police detained him - as he was walking from a private jet he'd taken from Moscow to a private helicopter that would ferry him and his family to a ski resort - at the request of the FBI.

After losing his, and the Russian government's, appeals, he was flown to Boston in December, to be formally charged with a variety of financial crimes based on his consulting firm's alleged ability to hack into servers holding American corporate data before it was publicly released, allowing the company to make successful stock trades in the companies. Some of his underlings, who did not leave for Swiss ski trips, had earlier been indicted in US courts for their alleged roles in trying to hack the 2016 elections.

After his arrival at Logan, Klyushin was ferried to the Plymouth County Correctional Facility, which has a contract to hold people awaiting trial on federal charges.

Klyushin had asked that he be released to 24-hour detention in an apartment near the federal courthouse in the Seaport, but US District Court Magistrate Judge Marianne Bowler agreed with prosecutors that Klyushin should remain locked up in the Plymouth county jail because a man with ready access to private jets and helicopters and his own yacht, who had been given an award by Vladimir Putin himself and who knew the ins and outs of international finance and travel was just too much of a flight risk - especially from an apartment just a short walk from Seaport docks.

Klyushin's lawyer had argued the Seaport apartment would make it easier for Klyushin to work on his own defense, in a case that will involve pouring over voluminous amounts of documents, many in Russian, that he would put up a London flat as security, that he would hire a private security firm to keep watch over him and that he was planning on selling the yacht anyway.

Bowler discounted all that, along with a letter from the Russian embassy in Washington that it would do nothing to help Klyushin escape the country.

Good reviews on Google

The Plymouth County Correctional Facility has 4.6 out of 5 stars.

I’m upvoting them.

My only question

is what exactly they will be pouring over those documents.

Maple syrup. They know they

Maple syrup. They know they shouldn't eat the evidence, but it's just so good.

Another Russian oligarch's yacht

Was moored in Majorca, and crewed by Ukrainians. He is the head of a weapons manufacturing company. One of the crew recognized a missile made by the company on a news report from Ukraine, and opened a couple of sea valves on the boat "partially sinking" it. The sailor was arrested, a judge released him, but he was rearrested and may be prosecuted.

[Link is to the original Spanish report. Here's one in English .]

Update: Here's a better report, from The Guardian.

It's true. Just a hole to

It's true. Just a hole to throw your money into.

That boat is the epitome

of Phallic Compensation.

I'd say Bezos's rocket beats it for the epitome

but, yeah, excessive.

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On board with Mike Potter, owner of 58m Superyacht Seawolf

Superyacht owner Mike Potter had made his fortune by the age of 51 – and that’s when the fun really started, with sailing, diving, vintage planes and family getting his full attention. Cécile Gauert catches up with the high-flying Canadian...

Mike Potter is trim and fit at 74 and as comfortable in a flight suit as in a wetsuit. The owner of 58.8 metre explorer Seawolf is an honorary colonel in the Royal Canadian Air Force and displays a very Canadian modesty about his accomplishments.

When I ask him about his background, he paints a quick portrait. “I was in the software business. I was very fortunate that it did well and I was comfortable bringing in professional management. It was a fair size by the time I did, so that allowed me to retire in the sense that I didn’t have to go to the office every day.”

Business articles tell the story differently. Potter forged a reputation as a trailblazer in the tech world, which earned him a lifetime achievement award from the Ottawa business community in 2016. He studied mathematics and physics, earned a master’s degree at the University of British Columbia and served with the Royal Canadian Navy.

He joined Quasar Systems in 1972 when he was 28. Two years later, he bought the company and renamed it Cognos. He took it public in 1986, following the success of the PowerHouse programming language that earned the company international renown. The largest computer software company in Canada, it employed 1,100 people worldwide by the early 1990s, and in 1995 Potter stepped aside. In 2007, IBM acquired what was now a major developer of business intelligence software for $4.9 billion.

He had been all in from the day he started and then, at 51, as the company was thriving, he decided to step aside, a move he was comfortable to make but which surprised some. He recalls telling a journalist who asked why he’d left such a successful company: “What’s the alternative? Is it better to step down when things are not going well?” He had decided it was time for him to do other things, explore his passions for sailing and flying and to raise a family. He did not retire exactly, but he had a lot more time to pursue personal interests, and a well-run family office allowed him to roam far and wide – “actually they encourage it”, he says.

An avid pilot since his early twenties, he started acquiring a collection of vintage aeroplanes in 2000 and in 2003 formed a non-profit organisation called Vintage Wings of Canada, which showcases restored aircraft at air shows and in a small museum.

“It’s an aspect of my life that has received a bit of attention in the community,” he says. “I have a collection of antique airplanes, mainly Second World War fighters, many flown by Canadians. We have British and American airplanes: Spitfire, Hurricane, Mustang, Kittyhawk, Corsair, and some even more rare examples from the 1930s and 1940s, plus a carbon-fibre aerobatic airplane and a 1950s era Canadian bush plane.” He has flown everything from gliders to a Dassault Falcon 200.

“I find sailors and pilots are often people who have the same interests,” he says. And he does love sailing. “I really grew up on the water. I was born in England, actually. My family moved to Canada when I was seven but I still remember living in a town called Southend right on the Thames Estuary. We bounced around with my family when we came to Canada, but we settled in Victoria on Vancouver Island. I grew up there and started sailing, and then I joined the Navy and went through military college.”

In the 1990s, he had a semi-custom 13 metre sailboat built in Bristol, Rhode Island. He took it from Cape Cod across the North Atlantic to Ireland and Scotland , south to the Canaries, back across the Atlantic to the Caribbean , and finally north again, completing the North Atlantic circle in Cape Cod in 1995. Friends joined him on each leg, making every trip a fondly remembered experience.

Eventually, he tapped naval architect Bill Langan, a yacht designer with Sparkman & Stephens , to create a custom 29 metre sailing yacht, which they built at Vitters . He kept that yacht for 10 years, sailing with his family throughout Europe, in the Mediterranean, the Baltic and around the UK, and in North America on both coasts as far north as Alaska .

Having a chance to spend time with his three growing daughters and exploring the world is what got the sailor into a motor yacht. He bought Seawolf , a converted ocean-going tug with its original 1956 engines, in 2008.

“What motivated me to do it really was my kids, who were four, nine and 11 at the time. I wanted several things that I wasn’t getting in a small sailboat. I wanted a little more space, so the kids could bring their friends, and I wanted to have the ability to carry equipment – toys, they call them. I wanted to carry things that could allow us to have activities aside from sailing. And I wanted the ability to go anywhere in the world. I wanted to discover the planet; not go just to the Caribbean and the Med.”

A broker brought to his attention a converted tug named Dolce Far Niente . Potter had started to think about trading his sailing yacht for a more modern explorer yacht, but when he saw the tug, as he says, “I fell in love with it”. It was more boat than he was intending to build, but he envisioned all that he could do with that deck space and range. The boat was built to go in any kind of weather, but it was more than a tough boat. It had a lovely aura of a bygone age .

The first time the tug caught the attention of the yachting world at large was at the 2002 Monaco Yacht Show, midway through a conversion carried out at Astilleros de Mallorca by a previous owner. The tug, built in the Netherlands and launched in 1957 as Clyde for L Smit & Co, was known for several feats of strength, including simultaneously towing two aircraft carriers and pulling supertankers through typhoons. But beyond that, it was a very good-looking boat, even before the conversion that brought it closer to yacht standards.

“She’s beautiful,” says Potter. “Although she was originally built in the 1950s as a commercial boat, I think the naval architect at the time made some effort to build a ship with beautiful lines. Then the conversion was done by somebody who was sensitive to that and kept those beautiful lines, so I liked that,” he says. “And it has a huge boat deck for storage. I put an 8.5 metre sailboat [a classic Herreshoff replica] on it and an 8.8 metre tender, which we use a lot for diving, plus I have a rowboat with a sliding seat, several kayaks and paddleboards, jet skis and most of all we have a massive amount of diving gear. We have a Nitrox system, we have a hyperbaric barometric chamber for emergencies, which I hope we never have to use, and enough equipment to put a dozen people of any size or skill level in the water at the same time.”

He still dives frequently and it’s a passion he now shares with his children. “I think that Seawolf has really made them divers more than sailors, but that’s OK. They like the water. That’s the most important thing,” he says.

Potter and the crew have a real bond with the boat and enjoy its history. The big six-cylinder Smit-MAN engines painted green chug steadily, watched over by an attentive engineer and are a sight to behold. The steady sound they make as the boat moves from anchorage to anchorage at night is as soothing as a lullaby.

The past is alive in the beautifully updated interior. A historically accurate model of Clyde is on board to remind all who sail in her of the ship’s past. It was a gift to Potter from his partner, Diane Cramphin, a designer who worked in secret with Seawolf ’s first officer to find it. She surprised him with it, and he loves to look at all its accurate details.

In August 2013, Potter helped organise an encounter in the Netherlands with the tug’s sistership Elbe . Like Seawolf , she’s had many lives, serving for a time as a support ship for Greenpeace, and now she’s a floating museum. The encounter took place in the boats’ original port of Maassluis, near Rotterdam, and the event attracted a crowd of enthusiasts and former Smit employees and their families. “We were surrounded by thousands of local people, many of whom went back a couple of generations, who were building and operating these tugs in the 1950s,” Potter says. In the crowd, tears in his eyes, was the son of the boat’s original designer, JCA Hoogenbosch.

This is very meaningful to Potter, who makes sure the boat is in tip-top shape. “Eventually this boat will have a new life with another family,” he says.

Having the boat has “given me a fantastic lifestyle being around family and friends. They say I am an active owner. I’ve done typically 80 days a year. I will probably do more than 100 days this year, but I’d live on it if I could.”

He doesn’t because he still has obligations shoreside and this allows Seawolf occasionally to be available for charter . The knowledgeable crew includes a marine biologist. Recently, Seawolf has cruised the Pacific from French Polynesia , to Fiji , Bali and the Philippines.

In spite of his attachment to Seawolf , with his children growing up and becoming independent, he thought he might have fewer opportunities to spend time with them, so a few months ago he put the boat on the market. However, shortly after we discussed his plans to get back into sailing, he took another trip aboard Seawolf to the Solomon Islands . During the voyage, he decided to withdraw it from sale. He told his broker he was simply having too much fun. “ Seawolf allows us to do so many different activities and keep hyperactive on every trip on board,” he says.“I love this boat."

First published in the January 2019 issue of BOAT International

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Hot on the trail of 56 superyachts owned by Russian oligarchs and subject to seizure

• Published: Mar. 06, 2022, 2:04 p.m.

French authorities have seized the yacht Amore Vero linked to Igor Sechin, a Putin ally who runs Russian oil giant Rosneft, as part of EU sanctions over Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The boat arrived in La Ciotat on Jan. 3 for repairs and was slated to stay until April 1 and was seized to prevent an attempted departure. (AP Photo/Bishr Eltoni) AP

• The Associated Press

The massive superyacht Dilbar stretches one-and-a-half football fields in length, about as long as a World War I dreadnought. It boasts two helipads, berths for more than 130 people and a 25-meter swimming pool long enough to accommodate another whole superyacht.

Dilbar was launched in 2016 at a reported cost of more than $648 million. Five years on, its purported owner, the Kremlin-aligned Russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov, was already dissatisfied and sent the vessel to a German shipyard last fall for a retrofit reportedly costing another couple hundred million dollars.

That’s where she lay in drydock on Thursday when the United States and European Union announced economic sanctions against Usmanov — a metals magnate and early investor in Facebook — over his ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin and in retaliation for the invasion of Ukraine.

“We are joining with our European allies to find and seize your yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets,” President Joe Biden said during his State of the Union speech Tuesday night, addressing the oligarchs. “We are coming for your ill-begotten gains.”

But actually seizing the behemoth boats could prove challenging. Russian billionaires have had decades to shield their money and assets in the West from governments that might try to tax or seize them.

Several media outlets reported Wednesday that German authorities had impounded Dilbar. But a spokeswoman for Hamburg state’s economy ministry told The Associated Press no such action had yet been taken because it had been unable to establish ownership of the yacht, which is named for Usmanov’s mother.

Dilbar is flagged in the Cayman Islands and registered to a holding company in Malta, two secretive banking havens where the global ultra-rich often park their wealth.

Still, in the industry that caters to the exclusive club of billionaires and centimillionaires that can afford to buy, crew and maintain superyachts, it is often an open secret who owns what.

Working with the U.K.-based yacht valuation firm VesselsValue, the AP compiled a list of 56 superyachts — generally defined as luxury vessels exceeding 79 feet in length — believed to be owned by a few dozen Kremlin-aligned oligarchs, seaborne assets with a combined market value estimated at more than $5.4 billion.

The AP then used two online services — VesselFinder and MarineTraffic — to plot the last known locations of the yachts as relayed by their onboard tracking beacons.

While many are still anchored at or near sun-splashed playgrounds in the Mediterranean and Caribbean, more than a dozen were underway to or had already arrived in remote ports in small nations such as the Maldives and Montenegro, potentially beyond the reach of Western sanctions. Three are moored in Dubai, where many wealthy Russians have vacation homes.

Another three had gone dark, their transponders last pinging just outside the Bosporus in Turkey — gateway to the Black Sea and the southern Russian ports of Sochi and Novorossiysk.

Graceful, a German-built Russian-flagged superyacht believed to belong to Putin, left a repair yard in Hamburg on Feb. 7, two weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine. It is now moored in the Russian Baltic port of Kaliningrad, beyond the reach of Western sanctions imposed against him this past week.

Some Russian oligarchs appear to have not gotten the memo to move their superyachts, despite weeks of public warnings of Putin’s planned invasion.

French authorities seized the superyacht Amore Vero on Thursday in the Mediterranean resort town of La Ciotat. The boat is believed to belong to Igor Sechin, a Putin ally who runs Russian oil giant Rosneft, which has been on the U.S. sanctions list since Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.

The French Finance Ministry said in a statement that customs authorities boarded the 289-foot Amore Vero and discovered its crew was preparing for an urgent departure, even though planned repair work wasn’t finished. The $120 million boat is registered to a company that lists Sechin as its primary shareholder.

On Saturday, Italian financial police in the port of San Remo seized the 132-foot superyacht Lena, which is flagged in the British Virgin Islands. Authorities said the boat belongs to Gennady Timchenko, an oligarch close to Putin and among those sanctioned by the European Union. With an estimated net worth of $16.2 billion, Timchenko is the founder of the Volga Group, which specializes in investments in energy, transport and infrastructure assets.

The 213-foot Lady M was also seized by the Italians while moored in the Riviera port town of Imperia. In a tweet announcing the seizure on Friday, a spokesman for Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said the comparatively modest $27 million vessel was the property of sanctioned steel baron Alexei Mordashov, listed as Russia’s wealthiest man with a fortune of about $30 billion.

But Mordashov’s upsized yacht, the 464-foot Nord, was safely at anchor on Friday in the Seychelles, a tropical island chain in the Indian Ocean not under the jurisdiction of U.S. or EU sanctions. Among the world’s biggest superyachts, Nord has a market value of $500 million.

Since Friday, Italy has seized $156 million in luxury yachts and villas in some of its most picturesque destinations, including Sardinia, the Ligurian coast and Lake Como.

Most of the Russians on the annual Forbes list of billionaires have not yet been sanctioned by the United States and its allies, and their superyachts are still cruising the world’s oceans.

The evolution of oligarch yachts goes back to the tumultuous decade after the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union, as state oil and metals industries were sold off at rock-bottom prices, often to politically connected Russian businessmen and bankers who had provided loans to the new Russian state in exchange for the shares.

Russia’s nouveau riche began buying luxury yachts similar in size and expense to those owned by Silicon Valley billionaires, heads of state and royalty. It’s a key marker of status in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and size matters.

“No self-respecting Russian oligarch would be without a superyacht,” said William Browder, a U.S.-born and now London-based financier who worked in Moscow for years before becoming one of the Putin regime’s most vocal foreign critics. “It’s part of the rite of passage to being an oligarch. It’s just a prerequisite.”

As their fortunes ballooned, there was something of an arms race among the oligarchs, with the richest among them accumulating personal fleets of ever more lavish boats.

For example, Russian metals and petroleum magnate Roman Abramovich is believed to have bought or built at least seven of the world’s largest yachts, some of which he has since sold off to other oligarchs.

In 2010, Abramovich launched the Bermuda-flagged Eclipse, which at 533 feet was at the time the world’s longest superyacht. Features include a wood-burning firepit and swimming pool that transforms into a dance floor. Eclipse also boasts its own helicopter hangar and an undersea bay that reportedly holds a mini-sub.

Dennis Cauiser, a superyacht analyst with VesselsFinder, said oligarch boats often include secret security measures worthy of a Bond villain, including underwater escape hatches, bulletproof windows and armored panic rooms.

“Eclipse is equipped with all sorts of special features, including missile launchers and self-defense systems on board,” Cauiser said. “It has a secret submarine evacuation area and things like that.”

Eclipse was soon eclipsed by Azzam, purportedly owned by the emir of Abu Dhabi, which claimed the title of longest yacht when it was launched in 2013. Three years after that, Usmanov launched Dilbar, which replaced another slightly smaller yacht by the same name. The new Dilbar is the world’s largest yacht by volume.

Abramovich, whose fortune is estimated at $12.4 billion, fired back last year by launching Solaris. While not as long as Eclipse or as big as Dilbar, the $600 million Bermuda-flagged boat is possibly even more luxurious. Eight stories tall, Solaris features a sleek palisade of broad teak-covered decks suitable for hosting a horde of well-heeled partygoers.

But no boat is top dog for long. At least 20 superyachts are reported to be under construction in various Northern European shipyards, including a $500 million superyacht being built for the American billionaire Jeff Bezos.

“It’s about ego,” Cauiser said. “They all want to have the best, the longest, the most valuable, the newest, the most luxurious.”

But, he added, the escalating U.S. and EU sanctions on Putin-aligned oligarchs and Russian banks have sent a chill through the industry, with boatbuilders and staff worried they won’t be paid. It can cost upwards of $50 million a year to crew, fuel and maintain a superyacht.

The crash of the ruble and the tanking of Moscow stock market have depleted the fortunes of Russia’s elite, with several people dropping off the list of Forbes billionaires last week. Cauiser said he expects some oligarch superyachts will soon quietly be listed by brokers at fire-sale prices.

The 237-foot Stella Maris, which was seen by an AP journalist docked this past week in Nice, France, was believed to be owned by Rashid Sardarov, a Russian billionaire oil and gas magnate. After publication of an earlier version of this story, AP was contacted Sunday by yacht broker Joan Plana Palao, who said his company represents a U.S. citizen from California who purchased the Stella Maris last month. He declined to disclose the name of the buyer or the person from whom the boat had been purchased.

On Thursday, the U.S. Treasury Department issued a new round of sanctions that included a press release touting Usmanov’s close ties to Putin and photos of Dilbar and the oligarch’s private jet, a custom-built 209-foot Airbus A340-300 passenger liner. Treasury said Usmanov’s aircraft is believed to have cost up to $500 million and is named Bourkhan, after his father.

Usmanov, whose fortune has recently shrunk to about $17 billion, criticized the sanctions.

“I believe that such a decision is unfair and the reasons employed to justify the sanctions are a set of false and defamatory allegations damaging my honor, dignity and business reputation,” he said in a statement issued through the website of the International Fencing Federation, of which he has served as president since 2008.

Abramovich has not yet been sanctioned. Members of the British Parliament have criticized Prime Minister Boris Johnson for not going after Abramovich’s U.K.-based assets, which include the professional soccer club Chelsea. Under mounting pressure, the oligarch announced this past week he would sell the $2.5 billion team and give the net proceeds “for the benefit of all victims of the war in Ukraine.”

Meanwhile, location transponders showed Solaris moored in Barcelona, Spain, on Saturday. Eclipse set sail from St. Maarten late Thursday and is underway in the Caribbean Sea, destination undisclosed.

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