EXCLUSIVE: Truth About Elvis' Grim End as 48th Death Anniversary Approaches — 'He Was Killed by Deadbeat Dad's Failure to Get Him Off Prescription Drugs'
Elvis could have been saved if his dad had stepped up, insiders say.
June 13 2025, Published 10:30 a.m. ET
Elvis’ death was caused by his tight-fisted father’s refusal to stop his son’s drug addiction, RadarOnline.com can reveal.
His overbearing dad Vernon got rid of Elvis’ so-called 'Memphis Mafia' bodyguards when they challenged the singer about his rampant drug abuse.
Shocking End
The King was found bloated and lifeless in his toilet.
Months later the King Of Rock ’N Roll’s lifeless body was found bloated and naked in his toilet after years of swallowing uppers and downers.
Elvis’ dad is blamed for the 42-year-old’s death by Sonny West – the singer's former bodyguard and key member of the Memphis Mafia.
Sonny said: "Elvis was on prescription drugs so in his mind they weren’t illegal, but he was abusing them.
"When he started experimenting with the downers as well as the uppers, that was when we started to get really concerned.
Huge Drugs Intake
The icon became reliant on a massive range of pharmaceuticals.
"He was on Dilaudid, which is five times more powerful than pure morphine and usually given to cancer patients who just can’t take the pain.
"We confronted Elvis and he told us to stay out of his business.
"He said if we didn’t stop talking to him about it we were going to be looking for other jobs.
"We didn’t stop it and four months later, we were fired on his order by his father."
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Insiders say the help he needed was totally missing.
Sonny added in the documentary The Last 24 Hours of Elvis the singer secretly ordered his father to suspend his security team for three months to “show them I’m still the boss” and give them $5,000 each to live on before he hired them again.
But the ex-minder said Vernon – who died aged 63 after years of keeping a stranglehold on his son’s finances – instead gave the Memphis Mafia three days’ notice and one week’s pay and never rehired them.
Sonny added: “It was goodbye.”
