BENJAMIN KEOUGH, GRANDSON OF ELVIS PRESLEY FOUND DEAD
Benjamin Keough, 27, was discovered by the police at around 6:30 AM on Sunday 12 July, with a single gunshot wound to the upper torso.
The police responded to a “rescue response” at his mother’s Calabasas mansion in California, and declared Keough dead on scene due to suspected suicide. Police are uncertain if whether Keough was alone at the residence.
Keough was the son of Lisa Marie Presley — the only child of superstar Elvis Presley — and musician Danny Keough.
Lisa Marie had previously stated to the media that Benjamin’s similarity to her father was ‘uncanny’. Lisa Marie’s manager said: ”She is completely heartbroken, inconsolable and beyond devastated but trying to stay strong for her 11-year-old twins and eldest daughter Riley.”
Lisa Marie married Benjamin’s father, Danny Keough who was the first of her four husbands, in 1988. The couple had two children together, Benjamin and his sister, the actress Riley Keough who is married to actor Ben Smith-Petersen.
Benjamin had mostly kept out of the public spotlight but was reported that in 2009 he had signed a 5 million dollar record deal with Universal. “The music will be nothing like Elvis, nothing like him at all,” he stated in an interview at the time.
Lisa Marie and her son were said to have a close connection and that the two both got mother and son matching tattoos around the time of his record deal.
In an interview with Healthy Living Magazine in 2014, Lisa Marie described her tight relationships with her children.
“We all stay together. We are all very close. I am very protective. I just smother them in love and I am also ferociously protective. They are my priority. That’s what I do. That’s what I care most about.”
A source close to the family has claimed that Keough had been struggling for some time and that the death, though still shocking to the family, won’t have come as a ‘huge surprise’.
Benjamin’s friend, musician DJ Ashba, wrote: ‘This cuts me to the bone. Literally in shock. I loved Ben like a brother and always will. 'Till we meet again my friend.’
Roy Orbison Jr, whose father performed with Keough’s grandfather, said: ‘Everybody please pray for Elvis Presley’s family. They have had another terrible tragedy today.’