LOS ANGELES (AP) — Priscilla Presley has filed legal papers challenging who oversees the estate of her late daughter Lisa Marie Presley.
The Los Angeles Superior Court filing last week challenges the validity of a 2016 amendment to Lisa Marie Presley’s living trust that removed Priscilla Presley and a former business executive as trustees and replaced them with Lisa Marie Presley’s two oldest children, Riley Keough and Benjamin Keough, whether she died or became disabled. Benjamin Keough died in 2020.
A living trust is a form of estate planning that allows a person to control their assets while they are alive, but have them distributed if they die. It fulfills the function of a will if a separate will is not filed, as appears to be the case with Lisa Marie Presley.
Lisa Marie Presley, a singer and the only child of Elvis Presley, died in a California hospital at the age of 54 on January 12 after paramedics responded to a 911 call reporting a woman in cardiac arrest. The Los Angeles County coroner is investigating and has not yet given a cause of death. She was buried in her family home, Gracelandis Jan 22.
Priscilla Presley’s court filing indicates that several issues call into question the authenticity of the living trust amendment.
The filing says they include a failure to notify Priscilla Presley of the change as required, a misspelling of Priscilla Presley’s name in a document purportedly signed by her daughter, an atypical signature of Lisa Marie Presley, and the absence of witness or notarization. He asks a judge to declare the amendment invalid.
The filing says business manager Barry Siegel intended to step down, which the trust’s preconditions would leave Priscilla Presley, 77, and Riley Keough, 33, as co-directors.
A message seeking comment from representatives for Riley Keough was not immediately returned.
Lisa Marie Presley left three surviving children. In addition to Riley Keough, her daughter with first husband Danny Keough, she had 14-year-old twin daughters with her fourth husband, Michael Lockwood.
Presley was declared divorced from Lockwood in 2021, but the two were still fighting over finances in family court when she died.
Priscilla Presley’s case is one of the first of what is likely to be many legal maneuvers surrounding the estate of Lisa Marie Presley, Elvis Presley’s sole heiress.
It is unclear, however, how much this estate is worth. A lawsuit filed by Lisa Marie Presley in 2018, alleging Siegel mishandled the trust, said it was worth more than $100 million, but most of it had been exhausted.
___
Follow AP Entertainment writer Andrew Dalton on Twitter: https://twitter.com/andyjamesdalton