A Missouri woman is accused of trying to defraud Elvis Presley’s family of millions of dollars and stealing the family’s ownership of Graceland, the American music legend’s family home.
Lisa Jeanine Findley, who used various aliases, was arrested for allegedly directing a scheme to fraudulently sell the Graceland estate, located at her home in Memphis, Tennessee.
Findley, 53, is charged with federal mail fraud and aggravated identity theft and is scheduled to appear in court Friday. If convicted, she could face up to 20 years in prison.
The Presley family has not commented publicly on the allegations.
The U.S. Department of Justice claims Ms. Findley impersonated three different individuals in connection with a fictitious private lending company called Naussany Investments & Private Lending LLC (Naussany Investments).
The Justice Department alleges she falsely claimed that Elvis Presley’s daughter – Lisa Marie Presley, who died in January 2023 – borrowed $3.8m (£3m) from Naussany Investments, pledged Graceland as collateral for the loan and defaulted on the loan.
Ms Findley is accused of demanding $2.85m (£2.2m) from the Presley family to settle the debt, according to the Department of Justice.
Among the fraudulent acts she was accused of were forging loan documents, forging the signature of Elvis Presley’s daughter, and placing a fraudulent foreclosure notice in one of Memphis’ daily newspapers, announcing that Naussany planned to auction Graceland on May 23.
When the Presley family sued Naussany Investments to block the sale of Graceland, Findley was also accused of filing false court documents, the Justice Department said.
The auction to sell Graceland attracted international attention earlier this year, after Presley’s granddaughter, actress Riley Keough, claimed the loan documents were fraudulent. She said her mother’s signature was a forgery.
Ms. Keough inherited Graceland, long a public museum honoring Mr. Presley, and much of Presley’s estate after her mother, Lisa Marie Presley, died last year.
She filed a lawsuit to stop the planned auction, and a Tennessee judge agreed.
At the time, Graceland and Elvis Presley Enterprises issued a statement to the BBC: “As the court has made clear, those claims have no merit.”
Elvis purchased the Graceland mansion in 1957 and lived there until his death two decades later.
The 14-acre complex opened to the public as a music history park in the early 1980s. Now officially a National Historic Landmark, it attracts about 600,000 visitors a year, according to the site.
Elvis died at Graceland and is buried there, as are his parents, daughter Lisa Marie Presley and her son, Benjamin Keough.
Attempts by the BBC to contact Ms Findley’s lawyer were unsuccessful.
She had a summary trial on Friday and was booked into jail in Greene County, Missouri.
