Priscilla Presley challenges Lisa Marie trust amendment that names Riley Keough co-trustee

Riley Keough, left, alongside her mother, Lisa Marie Presley, in 2017.Jordan Strauss / AP

By Maddie Ellis and Diana Dasrath

Priscilla Presley is asking a judge to declare that a "purported" 2016 amendment to her late daughter's trust naming Riley Keough as a co-trustee is invalid, according to legal documents obtained by NBC News.

The documents, filed on Jan. 26 in Los Angeles Superior Court, seek confirmation that Priscilla Presley will maintain control of Lisa Marie Presley's trust in the wake of her death on Jan. 12 at age 54 after experiencing cardiac arrest.

Lisa Marie Presley, the sole heir to her father Elvis Presley, executed a living trust in 1993, a legal mechanism for protecting one's assets and determining how they will be distributed after they die, according to the American Bar Association. According to the court filing, the trust was "completely restated" on Jan. 27, 2010, and appointed Priscilla Presley and her former business manager, Barry Siegel, as co-trustees.

But after the death of her daughter, Priscilla Presley found a document dated March 11, 2016, “pertaining to be an amendment” to the trust, according to the court document. The "purported" amendment removed both Lisa Marie Presley’s mother and manager as successor co-trustees and replaced them with her daughter Riley Keough and her son, Benjamin Keough. 

Benjamin Keough died in 2020 at age 27, leaving Riley Keough, 33, as the only trustee of her mother’s trust, according to the amendment.

In 2018, Lisa Marie Presley had sued her former manager Siegel accusing him of mismanaging her finances, according to Reuters. By 2016, the trust was left with more than $500,000 in credit card debt and $14,000 in cash, per Lisa Marie Presley's lawsuit. Siegel filed his own suit accusing her of squandering her inheritance.

According to the January filing, "there are many issues surrounding the authenticity and validity of the purported 2016 amendment." The alleged issues include that the amendment misspells Priscilla Presley's name, the amendment was never delivered to Priscilla Presley and Lisa Marie Presley's signature on the amendment "appears inconsistent with her usual and customary signature," the court document states.

Priscilla Presley’s filing seeks for the 2016 amendment to be declared invalid, meaning she would remains a trustee over her granddaughter.

Priscilla Presley reads a poem written by one of her granddaughter during a memorial service for Lisa Marie Presley at Graceland Sunday, Jan. 22, 2023.John Amis / AP

Lisa Marie Presley's death was honored on Jan. 22 in a public memorial service on the front lawn of Graceland, the former home of Elvis Presley.

A spokesman for the Memphis, Tennessee, estate previously confirmed to TODAY that Lisa Marie Presley’s three surviving children, Riley Keough and twins Harper and Finley Lockwood, would inherit Graceland.

At the service, Priscilla Presley shared a tribute from one of her granddaughters that said, "mama was my icon, my role model, my superhero, in much more ways than one."

Riley Keough's husband, Ben Smith-Petersen, shared a letter that she wrote, thanking her mom for being "the best mother for me."

Lisa Marie Presley was laid to rest in the Meditation Garden at Graceland next to her son.

On Jan. 27, Priscilla Presley thanked fans on Twitter for their love and support in her grief.

“Every parent who has lost a daughter or son knows what a dark painstaking journey it is,” she wrote.

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Priscilla Presley challenges Lisa Marie trust amendment that names Riley Keough co-trustee