Elvis Took 1 Death Threat Far More Seriously Than the Rest

Elvis Presley was one of the biggest celebrities in the world during his lifetime, but the death threats he received proved that not everyone was a fan. Elvis’ bodyguards said many of the threats the singer received were easy to write off as hoaxes. Sometimes, though, they took them quite seriously. They spoke about one that frightened them so badly they involved the FBI.

Elvis received one particularly distressing death threat

When Elvis began playing shows in Las Vegas after a break from live performances, he was closer to his fans than he’d been in years. This brought increased attention to him. With that came an influx of threats.

“We tried to keep most of it away from Elvis,” bodyguard Red West said in the book Elvis: What Happened? by Steve Dunleavy, “but there was a lot of serious stuff coming down that he had to know about.”

One particularly concerning threat came from someone claiming to have information about a possible assassination attempt. The caller said they would give up the assassin’s name for a price. Elvis and his entourage took it seriously enough that they involved the FBI. West said it terrified Elvis.

“I arrived there and Elvis just stumbled into my arms and hugged me,” West said. “There was no doubt that he was taking this very seriously. So were we.”

While the FBI was there, Elvis received a menu for his Las Vegas appearance. Someone had drawn a gun pointed at the picture of Elvis and written the message, “Guess who, and where?” Ultimately, the FBI never found the person behind it, even after checking for fingerprints.

“Nothing came of it, but that engagement we had Sonny [West] and Jerry Schilling in the musicians’ pit with their guns ready,” West said. “I was cruising the audience, so were the security guards at the hotel and the plainclothesmen of the FBI. As a matter of fact, one very suspicious guy I hassled turned out to be a Fed.”

Elvis received another concerning death threat during a performance

Two years later, Elvis was onstage when the venue’s maître d’ learned that there was a woman in the audience with a gun. The bodyguards quickly moved to protect the singer without having to end the performance.

“When we got the message, Red and I stood up in front on the stage as a block to Elvis,” Sonny West said. “Elvis moved to the back of the stage and sang in a sideways stance to make himself a smaller target.”

They stood there, terrified, for the remainder of the performance. Nobody attempted to hurt Elvis, though.

His bodyguards would have been willing to take a bullet for him

Though Red West admitted to feeling so scared he was shaking during this concert, he would have done whatever it took to protect Elvis. All of his bodyguards would have put their lives on the line for him.

“If anyone was going to hurt him, they would have had to kill us to get to him,” bodyguard Dave Hebler said. “That was the relationship.”