Graceland at risk, Elvis’ niece fights to save it

Graceland, Elvis Presley’s legendary villa in Memphis, risks being sold in a judicial auction on Thursday despite protests, including legal ones, from the singer’s niece, actress Riley Keough, who inherited the assets after his death in January 2023 of mother Lisa Marie. The news of the auction on May 23rd was given by the local TV network Wreg-tv. Riley is contesting the sale in every possible way and has got the lawyers involved by calling what is happening a scam and obtaining a suspension order from the judge, albeit temporary. “She’s traumatized” by what’s happening,” a source told the New York Post: “She would never have thought that a historic home could risk ending up in the hands of an ordinary stranger.” A company trying to sell the villa investment firm, Naussany Investments, that Lisa Marie, at the time of her death, had an outstanding $3.8 million loan for which she had used Graceland as collateral, a version that Keough disputed in court: ” Lisa Marie Presley never borrowed funds from Naussany Investments and never mortgaged the Graceland property”, reads the request to block the auction which also claims that the documents presented by the investment company are “false” starting from from Lisa Marie’s signature. Elvis bought Graceland in 1957 for just over one hundred thousand dollars, the same year as the release of hits such as Blue Christmas and All Shook Up. After the singer’s death, Lisa Marie became his heir in 1982 he transformed the villa into a museum visited every year by hundreds of thousands of fans.