Lisa Marie Presley’s Will Contested (with a twist!)

Feb 3

We’ve heard this story a thousand times before - a celebrity unexpectedly passes away and estate litigation quickly follows as family members discover they’ve been disinherited, omitted, or stripped of their authority in a Will or Trust. But Lisa Marie Presley’s will contest has a somewhat unusual twist.

Being the only child of Priscilla and music legend, Elvis Presley, it’s not clear how much is at stake in Lisa Marie’s estate. Like many descendants of wealthy celebrities, there have been rumors of financial turmoil or mismanagement (and that’s not the unusual part). What is unusual is that this isn’t a Will contest involving an alienated child or an alleged distant 'relative. Instead it’s Lisa Marie’s own mother - Priscilla Presley - pursuing litigation to invalidate her daughter’s Will.

Priscilla Presley’s intentions may be well-founded in this situation as the facts are certainly suspect (assuming the claims are accurate):

Amendment made to Will without providing the updated version to Priscilla, as required by the prior Will;
Amendment was not witnessed or notarized (as generally required by law);
Lisa Marie Presley’s signature appears inconsistent with her usual customary signature (forgery?).
Misspelled Priscilla’s name - which is not in and of itself material, but further goes to show that the update was made under suspicious circumstances (if you’re paying a legitimate attorney thousands of dollars to update your estate plan, you would hope they wouldn’t misspell the name of your mother, let alone the wife of Elvis Presley) - making you wonder, who drafted the document, who was directing it’s drafting, and who was involved in finalizing the document?

So, what did Lisa Marie Presley’s amendment do?

The 2016 amendment removed Priscilla and a former business manager, Barry Siegel, as co-trustees (apparently it had a testamentary trust within the Will, which is is why we are referring to trustees and not executors). The Will went on to replace the original co-trustees with Lisa Marie’s two children, Riley and Benjamin Keough, as the new co-trustees. In 2020, Benjamin passed away, which means it’s possible that Riley could be the only current serving trustee of the trust.

Trustees are generally in full control of administering all of the trust’s assets in accordance with the document. If the amendment is not found to be invalid, then that means Riley may be in control over millions of dollars that would otherwise have been under the stewardship of Priscilla.

Clearly, Priscilla is concerned over who would be in control of such funds (or intellectual property rights, if any) under the Will. At 77 years old, I can only guess that Priscilla must believe that either Riley is unfit for such a role or that she and Barry would be better suited to manage the complex estate.

If successful in invalidating the Will, then the prior version created in 2010 would still be in effect, and power and beneficial rights would revert to the former Will accordingly.

What can you do to avoid a Will contest?

Ideally, you’d have your property passing outside of probate. Lisa Marie’s situation is a little confusing because you may have noticed she mentions trusts and co-trustees, but that is only because she created a trust under the Will. Normally, you would create a separate revocable living trust that doesn’t pass under the Will, so it is in effect during your life (hence the word “living”). By having an active document in place during life, and by making sure it doesn’t go through the probate process, it’s much less likely to be contested (because it wouldn’t become public knowledge).

To add more protection to your Will and Trust, you can include a no-contest (also known as an “in terrorem”) clause to your documents - although that is only most effective when properly drafted. A no-contest clause that fails to take something away from a potential beneficiary if they were to contest the document in bad faith wouldn’t be as effective as one that promises some money in return for not causing a fuss. That is why you need to make sure you have a competent attorney drafting the document who can account for various contingencies applicable to your specific scenario.