Introduction to the Graceland Scheme
A Missouri woman was sentenced Tuesday to more than four years in prison in a brazen and blundering attempt to steal Graceland from the family of Elvis Presley.
Lisa Jeanine Findley, 54, who has gone by many other names in a criminal career spattered with financial grifts, was accused of posing as a bogus investor claiming rights to the historic landmark that draws more than half a million visitors a year. Presley lived at the Memphis estate until he suffered a fatal heart attack in 1977.
The Scheme Unfolds
The 57-month prison term, plus three years of probation, imposed by a federal judge in Memphis marked the final notes of a madcap plot born two years ago in a small city in Missouri’s Ozark Mountains. Findley declined to speak on her own behalf during the hearing.
Posing as someone named Kurt Naussany, an executive for a company that did not exist, Findley in July 2023 began emailing lawyers for Presley’s granddaughter, actor Riley Keough, who’d become the sole trustee and owner of Graceland following the death of her mother, Lisa Marie Presley, investigators said.
The Fake Loan and Foreclosure
Findley, pretending to be Naussany, demanded payment on a $3.8 million loan she said Lisa Marie Presley had taken out in 2018, putting up Graceland as collateral. The company, Naussany Investments, filed papers asserting its rights to the home, which it planned to unload in a foreclosure sale. None of it was true.
The documents, including the signatures of Lisa Marie Presley and a Florida notary who had nothing to do with the case, were forged. But the case progressed until May 2024, when Keough sued to stop the foreclosure, saying it was a scam. A judge shut it down.
Investigation and Arrest
After the con fizzled, reporters at NBC News and other media organizations received emails from someone posing as the swindlers saying they were actually West African identity thieves. “Come find us in Nigeria,” they said in an email to NBC News written in clunky Spanish.
By then, NBC News had started piecing together a series of clues left in the forged loan documents and legal filings. The clues led reporters to the Ozarks, where a tangle of local disputes on Facebook and Google review sites and in local courts ultimately tied the Graceland plot to Findley, a grandmother with a decadeslong history of romance rip-offs, forged checks and bank fraud.
Findley’s Past and Arrest
Originally from Oklahoma, Findley had moved to southwest Missouri not long before the Graceland swindle began, and was using aliases that included the name Naussany to harass and threaten local business owners. When an NBC News reporter confronted Findley at her front door in June 2024, she said she didn’t know anything about the Graceland plot and claimed that someone had stolen her identity.
NBC News published the results of its investigation that month. Eight weeks later, Findley was arrested on charges of mail fraud and aggravated identity theft in the Graceland case, and put in a Memphis jail, where she remained. In February 2025, she agreed to a plea deal in which she admitted mail fraud and prosecutors agreed to drop the second charge.
Sentencing and Reaction
A lawyer who represented Keough in the foreclosure dispute declined to comment on Tuesday. Keough’s estate lawyer did not respond to a request for comment.
In the weeks leading up to Tuesday’s sentencing, Findley and her defense lawyer argued for leniency, noting that she had not gone through with her fraudulent claim to Graceland and never made any money off of it.
“This outrageously concocted scheme was, to quote Marvin Gaye, ‘doomed from the start,’” her court-appointed public defender, Tyrone Paylor, wrote in a court filing.
Prosecutors countered that Findley only gave up after she was caught. Prosecutors also revealed that after Findley learned she was under investigation, she sent an email to investigators referring to herself in the third person and telling investigators that an “illegal” from Belize was responsible.
Conclusion
The sentencing of Lisa Jeanine Findley brings an end to a bizarre and elaborate scheme to steal Graceland from the Presley family. The case highlights the importance of vigilance and thorough investigation in preventing and prosecuting financial crimes.
FAQs
Q: Who is Lisa Jeanine Findley?
A: Lisa Jeanine Findley is a 54-year-old woman from Missouri who was sentenced to 57 months in prison for attempting to steal Graceland from the Presley family.
Q: What was Findley’s scheme?
A: Findley posed as a bogus investor and claimed that Lisa Marie Presley had taken out a $3.8 million loan using Graceland as collateral. She demanded payment and threatened to foreclose on the property.
Q: How was Findley caught?
A: NBC News investigators pieced together clues from forged loan documents and legal filings, which led them to Findley in the Ozarks.
Q: What is Findley’s criminal history?
A: Findley has a decades-long history of financial crimes, including romance rip-offs, forged checks, and bank fraud.
