text: An affluent Connecticut couple disappeared a week after losing an appeal over more than $2.2 million they owe in debt, according to court records. 
   
   Jeffrey Navin, 56, and Jeanette Navin, 55, were reported missing by relatives on Aug. 7, three days after they were last seen near their home in Easton, about 65 miles north of midtown Manhattan, police said. 
   
   The couple's car was found in a park-n-ride off Exit 42 of the Merritt Parkway in Westport on Aug. 9, police said. 
   
   The Navins could be on vacation because they travel often, Easton Police Chief Tim Shaw told reporters Tuesday. But they usually tell their relatives they're leaving, and authorities expected them to return home over the weekend. 
   
   He said police did not suspect foul play in the disappearance of Jeffrey, who runs a sanitation company in Westport, and Jeanette, who works as a paraprofessional at Weston Intermediate School's library. 
   
   A week before their disappearance, a judge denied the Navins' second motion to appeal in a foreclosure case worth millions with HSBC Bank USA, court records show. 
   
   HSBC filed the suit in 2007 after the couple allegedly failed to pay a cent on their $1.3 million mortgage on another house in Guilford, the Hartford Courant reported. 
   
   The debt on the 8,265-square-foot house -- which has six bedrooms and a 10-acre wooded property, according to real estate site Zillow -- nearly doubled by December 2014 to a whopping $2.2 million. 
   
   The case is still pending but is not the only one against the Navins for debt. 
   
   In November, a power company claimed Jeffrey owed $139,000 in unpaid electric fees for the same house, court records show. A judge ordered him to pay it back in weekly installments of $35. 
   
   The couple sold a house in 2012 to resolve another foreclosure filed by OCWEN Financial Corp. in 1999, according to records. The sale was linked to a 2002 civil case involving Jeffrey and Essex Savings Bank, although the details of that case were not immediately available. 
   
   But relatives denied Thursday morning that the couple's money problems caused them to go missing, noting their bank accounts are "untouched" during this "overwhelming and troubling time." 
   
   "Financial issues recently reported by the media have not been proven to be a factor for our family members' disappearance," the family said in a statement. 
   
   "We are shocked and saddened at the unexpected disappearance of Jeff and Jeanette Navin. There are no words to describe the impact this has had on their parents, siblings and children. We wish only for their safe return." 
   
   Shaw told the Daily News Thursday that he could not comment "on anything as far as financial records go." 
   
   "We're investigating everything that we can," Shaw said. 
   
   The couple earned up to $216,000 a year, according to Nexis Lexis records. The Navins also moved into a custom-built 4,000-square-foot house in Westport in 1994 and sold it for $900,000 in June, records show. They soon began renting a home in Easton, where the median household income is $142,000 -- double the state average. 
   
   Jeffrey's company, J&J Refuse, began with "one man in a truck in 1985 and has been growing ever since," according to its website. It does not appear to be one of the municipality's vendors, according to town financial records. 
   
   Jeanette is a "beloved employee" for the Weston Public Schools district, where she has worked for 18 years, Superintendent Colleen Palmer said in an email to staff Tuesday. 
   
   The Navins' longtime attorney, Kenneth Davis, said he hasn't seen them in about a month and that he doubts their debt would lead to physical harm against them. 
   
   "I'm in the dark just like everybody is," he told the Courant. "I just hope they're all right." 
   
   ON MOBILE? WATCH THE VIDEO HERE. ||||| The investigation into the disappearance of an Easton couple has been turned over to the state police and detectives are searching a Bridgeport home belonging to their son. 
   
   Jeffrey and Jeanette Navin were reported missing Aug. 7 to the Easton Police Department, and while it is still technically considered a missing persons case, the State Police Western District Major Crime Squad has taken over the investigation. 
   
   Late Wednesday, state police and Bridgeport detectives searched a house on Aldine Avenue in Bridgeport where Kyle Navin, the couple's son, lives. 
   
   Police have not said why they searched the home. Kyle Navin is listed as the general manager of the family's refuse company. 
   
   Sources said evidence found in the couple's abandoned pickup truck that has since been sent to the state forensic laboratory for analysis led investigators to ramp up the investigation, with as many as a half-dozen detectives working on it. 
   
   The state police are poring through a ton of paperwork trying to backtrack where the Navins may have been before they disappeared. — Easton Police Chief Timothy Shaw 
   
   The couple's truck was found Aug. 9 in a commuter parking lot off exit 42 of the Merritt Parkway, on the border of Weston and Westport. Until recently, the Navins lived in Weston. Their family-owned garbage company, J&J Refuse, operates in Westport. 
   
   Jeffrey Navin, 56, was last seen at work Aug. 4. Police have not said when anyone last had contact with Jeanette Navin, 55. 
   
   "The state police are poring through a ton of paperwork trying to backtrack where the Navins may have been before they disappeared," Easton Police Chief Timothy Shaw said. 
   
   Sources said investigators are reviewing bank records, credit card purchases and cellphone records, as well as talking to the couple's friends and coworkers. It is unclear if their cellphones have been found. 
   
   "We are looking at everything, nothing is being ruled out," Shaw said this week. Investigators from Easton are assisting the state police. 
   
   Police initially suspected the Navins, who liked to take spur-of-the-moment vacations, had gone away without telling anyone. But as time passed, police said they began to suspect the two either willingly disappeared or were victims of foul play. 
   
   A review of public records shows the Navins had spent part of the past few months downsizing and paying off old debts. 
   
   On May 28, Jeanette Navin sold the family's longtime home on Osborn Farm Road in Weston for $900,000, records show. The couple moved to a rental home in Easton, where they were living at the time of their disappearance. Police have searched the home for evidence. 
   
   The Navins had owned the Weston property since 1994 when Jeanette Navin purchased it for $135,000. Over the years they had made several improvements to the home, including spending more than $25,000 to install an in-ground swimming pool, according to Weston town records. 
   
   In June, three old mortgages and home equity loans that Jeanette Navin had taken out on the Osborn Farm Road home were released. More than $780,000 in mortgages held by People's Bank and JPMorgan Chase bank were released between June 9 and June 26, records show. 
   
   Jeffrey Navin is not listed on any of the legal documents for the Weston home. 
   
   Jeffrey Navin was involved in a legal battle over a $1.4 million home that he owns in Guilford that was originally built by Colleen McCullough, the author of the best-selling book "The Thorn Birds," as a retreat. Court records show that Navin has been involved in a long-running foreclosure battle over a Guilford house at 7 Hart Landing Road. 
   
   HSBC Bank USA filed a foreclosure against Navin in 2007, alleging that he had failed to pay any of a $1.3 million mortgage on 7 Hart Landing Road. Navin has appealed the judgment against him twice but lost both times. 
   
   The case is still pending in New Haven court eight years after it was filed. A judge denied Navin's latest attempt to reopen the case in late July, court records show. The debt that Navin owes has grown to $2.2 million as of the end of 2014, according to court records. 
   
   Connecticut Light & Power, now called Eversource, also took Navin to court last year, claiming he owed about $130,600 for electrical service for the Hart Landing Road house. In November, Navin was ordered to pay $138,137.79 in $35 weekly payments, plus interest. Navin, who disputed the amount owed, appealed. 
   
   The Guilford house was listed for sale at a price of $1.4 million by the Settlers & Traders Real Estate Co. in Westport. But the listing agent, Michael Calise, said Wednesday that the house is no longer on the market. He said a third party recently told him to take it off the market. He declined to comment further. 
   
   Jeffrey Navin has operated J&J Refuse Inc. in Westport since the mid-1980s. The company's website was taken off-line in the days after it became public that the couple was missing, but has recently gone back online, and the couple's son, Kyle Navin, is listed as the operations manager. 
   
   Jeanette Navin has worked in the Weston school district since 1996. She is a paraprofessional assigned to the Weston Intermediate School library. School officials said that since word of her disappearance became public, concerned parents have been calling. 
   
   "Jeanette is a beloved member of our school community," Weston Superintendent Colleen Palmer said in a statement. 
   
   "Our entire district is extremely concerned that she and her husband have not yet been located, and we continue to offer our support in any way that would further the efforts of law enforcement to find them and bring them home safely." ||||| Story highlights Jeffrey and Jeanette Navin of Easton, Connecticut, were last seen on August 4 
   
   Days earlier, they'd lost in court over $2.2 million in debt tied to their second home 
   
   Their family says the financial woes may have nothing to do with the disappearance 
   
   (CNN) A Connecticut couple has disappeared days after losing their latest appeal in a multimillion-dollar foreclosure case, a disappearance that a local police chief said appears increasingly suspicious though the pair's family said it may be unrelated to their financial woes. 
   
   Jeffrey and Jeanette Navin of Easton, Connecticut, were last seen on Tuesday, August 4, at the refuse company they own in Westport, according to Easton Police Chief Tim Shaw. 
   
   In late July, Jeffrey Navin was denied his latest appeal in an ongoing eight-year battle over a mortgage on the family's second home in central Connecticut, according to court documents. 
   
   Navin took out a mortgage on the home -- a six-bedroom, five-bath, 8,265-square foot residence on a 10½-acre lot, according to Zillow.com -- in 2005 for $1.3 million and stopped paying in 2007, the records show. The debt had grown to more than $2.2 million by the end of 2014. 
   
   Authorities cannot say yet that these issues have anything to do with the couple's disappearance. 
   
   Read More
target: – A Connecticut couple in their mid-50s has been missing for two weeks now, and police are investigating whether their financial troubles—including $2.2 million in debt—may have something to do with it, reports CNN. Their families, however, aren't buying it. Police found the pickup belonging to Jeffrey and Jeanette Navin in a commuter parking lot by the exit of a local expressway on Aug. 9 but say there's no sign of foul play. The Easton police chief says it's possible the Navins are on vacation somewhere safe and sound, but acknowledges that suspicion is mounting the longer they remain out of touch. Money problems had been piling up for the Navins, last seen Aug. 4 at a garbage company they own. Jeffrey took out a $1.3 million mortgage on a six-bedroom-five-bathroom house in 2005 and stopped paying it in 2007. He lost his third appeal over the $2.2 million he owes in the foreclosure case in July. He also racked up six-figure debt to the power company. The Hartford Courant reports the couple sold another of their homes for $900,000 in June and moved to a rental house. Family members object to the focus on finances and point out that the couple, who earned up to $216,000 a year, haven't touched their bank accounts in this "overwhelming and troubling time," the Daily News reports. Jeffrey's attorney can't shed any light: "I'm in the dark just like everybody else is," he tells the Courant. "I just hope that they're all right." (In Florida, a female firefighter who has been missing for 9 years was just declared dead.)