Latest / Conspiracy! The Show / The Death of Elvis Presley Pt. 2: Dr. Nick (Repost)

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The Death of Elvis Presley Pt. 2: Dr. Nick (Repost) · Conspiracy! The Show

0:00
Speaker 1: Elvis Presley was a giant on America's cultural landscape. A
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Speaker 1: man filled with passion and fire at a time when
0:06
Speaker 1: most of the rest of the country was sleepwalking through
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Speaker 1: its cultural life. He didn't invent rock and roll. He
0:12
Speaker 1: just hand carried it into the mainstream. Elvis Presley was different,
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Speaker 1: and because he was good at it, it paid off.
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Speaker 1: All 28 of his movies were moneymakers, and his records
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Speaker 1: have sold somewhere between 7 and 800 million copies. That
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Speaker 1: works out to roughly one Elvis Presley record for each
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Speaker 1: family on the face of the earth. Despite the fact
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Speaker 1: that hundreds of thousands of people worshiped him, the king
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Speaker 1: demonstrated the fact of his mortality when he died at
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Speaker 1: the age of 42. They told us of a heart attack.
0:42
Speaker 1: But did Elvis Presley really die of a heart attack?
0:52
Speaker 2: Welcome to Conspiracy, the show... The world's most trusted conspiracy
1:02
Speaker 2: theory podcast. With your hosts, Adam Todd Brown and Olivia Hygar.
1:18
Speaker 3: Hey, everybody. Welcome to Conspiracy The Show. I'm your host,
1:23
Speaker 3: Adam Todd Brown. And let me tell you, I'm all
1:26
Speaker 3: shook up for this week's co-host.
1:29
Speaker 4: Oh, ho, ho.
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Speaker 3: My favorite co-host of all. No co-host. I don't even
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Speaker 3: have any guests. Unless you count the alleged ghost of
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Speaker 3: Elvis A. Ron Presley. I am continuing my deep dive
1:42
Speaker 3: into his death. I don't know. I'm still not convinced.
1:46
Speaker 3: No matter how much Geraldo Rivera wants me to be.
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Speaker 3: Remember that I mentioned him at the end of last
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Speaker 3: week's episode? Or did you pretend you didn't hear it? Understandable.
1:56
Speaker 3: If so, that guy kind of sucks. But the fact remains,
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Speaker 3: Geraldo Rivera was actually a key figure in the reporting
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Speaker 3: around a potential cover-up in the death of Elvis Presley.
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Speaker 3: He was coming at it from a different angle than
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Speaker 3: last week's subject, Gail Brewer-Giorgio. While her suspicion is that
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Speaker 3: Elvis faked his death, Geraldo is more convinced that the
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Speaker 3: local medical examiner was involved in a cover-up meant to
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Speaker 3: hide the truth, which is that Elvis... died of a
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Speaker 3: drug overdose. It's exactly the kind of story that would
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Speaker 3: make a person like Elvis want to fuck off to
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Speaker 3: Argentina forever. I get that we're talking about one of
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Speaker 3: the most famous people of all time, but hey, Elvis
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Speaker 3: wasn't an elected official. Taxpayer money didn't pay his salary.
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Speaker 3: His job did not involve public safety. No matter what
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Speaker 3: happened on August 16th, 1977, there has never been a
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Speaker 3: point in history when we the public were entitled to
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Speaker 3: know every single detail about how or even if Elvis died.
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Speaker 3: And we probably never will. But my concerns about this
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Speaker 3: Geraldo story go beyond invasions of privacy and HIPAA violations.
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Speaker 3: HIPAA didn't even exist back then anyway. I'll put it
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Speaker 3: this way. If Elvis did die in 1977, Geraldo is
3:20
Speaker 3: absolutely right. about what he's getting at in this report.
3:26
Speaker 3: But if Elvis did fake his death with the help
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Speaker 3: of the FBI and join the Witness Protection Program, which
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Speaker 3: is the claim that all of this is building up to,
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Speaker 3: if that is what happened, this Geraldo Rivera 2020 report
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Speaker 3: is intentionally or not absolutely part of that scheme. And
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Speaker 3: when I say absolutely, I mean it in that non-absolute,
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Speaker 3: I can never prove it, So I'm not actually saying
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Speaker 3: it happened kind of way. All we got anymore is
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Speaker 3: our gut when it comes to a lot of this stuff.
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Speaker 3: And my gut tells me this 2020 report is up
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Speaker 3: to something. Let's talk about the report itself, and then
4:08
Speaker 3: we'll talk about why I feel that way. One of
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Speaker 3: the first people Geraldo talks to is Ginger Alden, Elvis
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Speaker 3: Presley's then-fiancee, She is the person who found his body.
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Speaker 3: Geraldo asks what she was told killed him, and she
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Speaker 3: says that she was told Elvis died of a heart attack.
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Speaker 3: This is an interesting detail. Aside from the part where
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Speaker 3: it would involve other people, I kind of wish I
4:32
Speaker 3: was doing this episode live or with other people, because
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Speaker 3: I am curious about what... people these days think did
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Speaker 3: kill Elvis. Everyone knows he died on or around the toilet,
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Speaker 3: but I think folks might be surprised to know that
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Speaker 3: the exact cause of Elvis's death is a hotly debated
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Speaker 3: topic that still hasn't been completely settled. Throughout this episode,
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Speaker 3: you're going to hear references to the autopsy results. If
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Speaker 3: you Google around a little, you'll find a document out
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Speaker 3: there that's often referred to as the autopsy report. It
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Speaker 3: is not. The document that's out there is the medical
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Speaker 3: examiner's report. And there is a bunch of weirdness around
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Speaker 3: that document as well. And we'll get to it in
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Speaker 3: a bit. But the autopsy results, we, for the most part,
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Speaker 3: still have not seen those. Vernon Presley, Elvis's dad, ordered
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Speaker 3: that they be sealed for 50 years. The autopsy results
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Speaker 3: won't be released until 2027. Did you know that? I
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Speaker 3: did not know that. I'm sure I've heard it at
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Speaker 3: various points throughout my conspiracy theory travels. But if so,
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Speaker 3: it wasn't a detail I'd committed to memory. You'll see
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Speaker 3: some tabloid-ish articles out there that claim to reveal the
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Speaker 3: results of that autopsy. But they're actually just accounts of
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Speaker 3: what a guy who claims to have seen the autopsy
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Speaker 3: results has to say about it. What's the difference between
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Speaker 3: a medical examiner's report and autopsy results? I also did
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Speaker 3: not know that, but I looked it up. And from
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Speaker 3: what I gather, the coroner or medical examiner's report rules
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Speaker 3: on the circumstances or manner of death, natural causes, accident, homicide, etc.
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Speaker 3: And then the autopsy is the deep dive that figures
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Speaker 3: out why the deceased got unalived in the way that
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Speaker 3: they did. That makes perfect sense because the autopsy report
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Speaker 3: in air quotes that you can find online is two
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Speaker 3: pages long and it has none of the gory details
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Speaker 3: you'd expect from an autopsy report. Geraldo's claims in this
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Speaker 3: 2020 episode center around the medical examiner's report and Geraldo's
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Speaker 3: belief that releasing the autopsy results will confirm his claims.
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Speaker 3: The main gripe he has is that, allegedly, lots of
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Speaker 3: people who were in the room for the autopsy wanted
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Speaker 3: to issue a ruling that Elvis died from unknown circumstances,
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Speaker 3: but that awesomely named Shelby County medical examiner Dr. Jerry
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Speaker 3: Francisco went rogue and immediately told the world Elvis died
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Speaker 3: of a heart attack. That's the elevator pitch version of
7:22
Speaker 3: what's happening in this 2020 episode. The medical examiner says
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Speaker 3: it's a heart attack. Geraldo thinks it's drugs, and he
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Speaker 3: wants to see the autopsy results. so he can confirm it.
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Speaker 3: After running through all of those questions, the 2020 report
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Speaker 3: moves on to a reconstruction of the last 12 hours
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Speaker 3: of Elvis's life. One hour before midnight, on the night
7:44
Speaker 3: before he died, Elvis had a dentist appointment. That's being
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Speaker 3: rich and famous for you. 11 p.m. dental appointments. As
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Speaker 3: mentioned on the last episode, Elvis was scheduled to leave
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Speaker 3: for a tour on the day he died, and he
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Speaker 3: was trying to get his teeth cleaned. for it. Granted,
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Speaker 3: he didn't order any costumes for that tour, and he
8:04
Speaker 3: didn't have his hair or sideburns dyed for that tour,
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Speaker 3: if Gale Brewer Giorgio is to be believed. And that
8:11
Speaker 3: sure is weird, but he did get his teeth cleaned?
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Speaker 5: Sure.
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Speaker 3: But also that dental appointment probably wasn't all that it
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Speaker 3: seemed to be. We'll get to that in a minute.
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Speaker 3: After a couple hours of typical Elvis night owl jibber
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Speaker 3: jabber with his team, around 4 a.m. or so, Elvis
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Speaker 3: did exactly what you'd expect fat, drug-addled, end-of-days Elvis to
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Speaker 3: do at four in the morning. He played a couple
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Speaker 3: hours of racquetball. From there, Ginger Alden says he called
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Speaker 3: for medication to help him sleep at around 6.30 a.m.,
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Speaker 3: and after taking it, he started reading a book about
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Speaker 3: psychic energy. That all does definitely sound like the Elvis
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Speaker 3: we know. He got up again at 8 a.m. because
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Speaker 3: he couldn't sleep, at which point he requested more drugs.
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Speaker 3: It's worth noting, as far as I can tell, this
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Speaker 3: 2020 report is kind of where this version of events
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Speaker 3: comes from. And it is the official version of events.
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Speaker 3: This is original Geraldo reporting built from interviews with people
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Speaker 3: who were there. It's possible that reporting and people who
9:18
Speaker 3: were there might deserve some air quotes. Whatever the case,
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Speaker 3: while there were definitely actual court cases and things of
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Speaker 3: the like in regards to the death of Elvis, it
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Speaker 3: all comes after this 2020 report. And it's this report
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Speaker 3: that prompted the biggest criminal case in the death of
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Speaker 3: Elvis Presley. But more on that later. Back to those
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Speaker 3: last 12 hours in the life of Elvis. After getting
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Speaker 3: that second batch of medicine, He gets up a third
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Speaker 3: time and takes the book about psychic energy to the bathroom.
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Speaker 3: Ginger Alden tells him not to fall asleep, and then
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Speaker 3: she immediately falls asleep. She eventually finds him dead in
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Speaker 3: the bathroom around 2 p.m.
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Speaker 5: That day.
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Speaker 3: Authorities arrive. He's taken to the hospital. He's dead. Let's
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Speaker 3: get into one of Geraldo's first claims.
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Speaker 2: Item.
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Speaker 1: ABC News has learned that no immediate discovery was made
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Speaker 1: of any disease or injury which could have caused Elvis's death.
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Speaker 1: His heart was indeed enlarged and muscular, and there was
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Speaker 1: significant blockage of the arteries. But according to two doctors
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Speaker 1: present at the autopsy, serious heart disease was still years
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Speaker 1: away for Elvis Presley.
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Speaker 3: So Elvis had an enlarged heart and some arteries were blocked,
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Speaker 3: but he was still years away from serious heart disease.
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Speaker 3: That comes up in this episode. What's interesting about this
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Speaker 3: is what isn't said. Geraldo is claiming this is coming
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Speaker 3: from people who were present for the autopsy, and he
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Speaker 3: talks to some of those people. And you know what
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Speaker 3: no one ever says? Elvis had a colon the size
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Speaker 3: of a baby whale. I don't know that he did,
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Speaker 3: but that has become a detail of this story in
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Speaker 3: the years since, mostly starting with those tabloid articles from
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Speaker 3: a few years ago. That's one of the details about
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Speaker 3: this 2020 report that kind of doesn't sit right with me.
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Speaker 3: Geraldo is talking to doctors and hospital personnel who say
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Speaker 3: they were in the room for the autopsy, and all
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Speaker 3: of them sort of weave in and out of openly
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Speaker 3: sharing details about what they saw, like how they were
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Speaker 3: convinced it was a drug overdose, but then also saying
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Speaker 3: they can't tell him what they saw because because of
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Speaker 3: privacy reasons. So we hear all about how they think
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Speaker 3: it was drugs, but any specific details fall victim to
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Speaker 3: medical privacy, we can't say. And now, we've been through
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Speaker 3: this next part already. Doctors decide to tell the world
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Speaker 3: Elvis died of, quote, unknown causes, on account of him
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Speaker 3: having some, but not enough, heart disease and an apparently
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Speaker 3: unremarkable colon. But then Dr. Jerry Francisco comes out and
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Speaker 3: tells the world that Elvis died of a heart attack.
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Speaker 3: Geraldo talks about how Dr. Francisco refused to be interviewed
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Speaker 3: and also refused to release the autopsy results. 2020 eventually
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Speaker 3: sued to get a copy of that autopsy report, and
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Speaker 3: that's what got the autopsy report sealed for 50 years.
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Speaker 3: This seems to be correct. They interviewed Dr. Neil Florendo,
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Speaker 3: who was also in the autopsy room.
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Speaker 5: Dr.
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Speaker 4: Florendo.
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Speaker 6: In your medical judgment, was there any evidence that Elvis Presley.
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Speaker 5: Died of a heart attack?
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Speaker 7: From what I saw grossly and from what my limited
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Speaker 7: judgment was at that particular time, there was no gross
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Speaker 7: evidence of a heart attack.
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Speaker 5: There was no gross evidence of a heart attack? No
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Speaker 5: gross evidence of a heart attack. Were you surprised by Dr.
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Speaker 1: Francisco's announcement that he had died of cardiac arrhythmia?
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Speaker 5: Personally, yes, I was surprised.
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Speaker 3: There's another important figure in this, Dr. Muirhead. who tells
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Speaker 3: Geraldo there was no sign of a heart attack. He
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Speaker 3: also runs down the list of drugs that were alleged
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Speaker 3: to have been in Elvis' system. Codeine, morphine, quaalude, valium, valmid, placidyl, nembutol, phenobarbital, pentobarbital, butabarbital.
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Speaker 3: It's explained that all of these are central nervous system depressants,
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Speaker 3: often abused, several of them very addictive. There are some
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Speaker 3: weird details about this toxicology report where this list of
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Speaker 3: drugs comes from. It seems like at the time, the
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Speaker 3: hospital where Elvis's autopsy is alleged to have been done,
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Speaker 3: they didn't have a lab that was capable of doing
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Speaker 3: the kind of toxicology reports they needed. So these results
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Speaker 3: come from a lab in California. And there is, as
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Speaker 3: we'll find out later on, some dispute as to their
14:02
Speaker 3: news worthiness. But first, let's hear from Geraldo again.
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Speaker 8: Item.
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Speaker 1: Elvis's stomach contents were destroyed without ever having been analyzed.
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Speaker 3: Okay, now that's a tasty detail. You can determine a
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Speaker 3: lot of things from stomach contents, including time of death.
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Speaker 3: That's one detail history seems to agree on. We know
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Speaker 3: the window of time in which he died thanks to
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Speaker 3: this ABC 2020 report and Ginger Alden later writing a
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Speaker 3: book about her experience with Elvis. Destroying the stomach contents
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Speaker 3: could be a means of hiding that drugs were involved.
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Speaker 3: It could also be a sign that no one died
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Speaker 3: at all. You know, maybe there are no stomach contents.
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Speaker 3: Whatever the case, Dr. Jerry Francisco comes out two months
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Speaker 3: later and doubles down on his finding that a heart
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Speaker 3: attack killed Elvis. So what's fascinating about this to me
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Speaker 3: is that someone's lying, right? The only question is why?
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Speaker 3: Why and who? Speaking of that, Cyril Wecht shows up
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Speaker 3: in this. Geraldo takes the findings of that toxicology report
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Speaker 3: from the lab in California and shows them to several
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Speaker 3: different pathologists and various medical experts. Cyril Wecht is one
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Speaker 3: of them. I don't know how much I trust that guy.
15:22
Speaker 3: He shows up in pretty much any case where the
15:25
Speaker 3: media has a role in crafting a potentially incorrect report.
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Speaker 3: version of events. Celebrity pathologists don't become celebrities by being
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Speaker 3: the best. They do it by saying what people want
15:37
Speaker 3: them to say in the right moments. Look into the
15:40
Speaker 3: details of any high profile murder case. Michael Peterson, Scott Peterson,
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Speaker 3: Stephen Avery, you name it. In every case, one side
15:49
Speaker 3: finds a medical expert who's willing to say the evidence
15:53
Speaker 3: points to to one finding, and the other side always
15:56
Speaker 3: finds a medical expert who's willing to say the evidence
16:00
Speaker 3: points to their finding. It's almost as if some of
16:04
Speaker 3: the science we use to send people to prison could
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Speaker 3: maybe be a little more faulty than we've been led
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Speaker 3: to believe. But hey, that's a talk for another day.
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Speaker 3: Let's listen to Cyril Wecht. To be certain, we.
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Speaker 1: Asked for a second expert opinion. We provided the data
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Speaker 1: to Dr. Cyril Wecht, the coroner for Pittsburgh and Allegheny
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Speaker 1: County for analysis.
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Speaker 8: Dr.
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Speaker 1: Wecht is one of the foremost medical examiners in the
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Speaker 1: entire country.
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Speaker 8: I believe that Mr. Presley died as a result of
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Speaker 8: a combined drug effect, various drugs, all of which are
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Speaker 8: known to be central nervous system depressants. collectively cause the
16:43
Speaker 8: heart and lung to be depressed. The brain controls the
16:47
Speaker 8: activities of the heart and lung involuntarily. And when the
16:50
Speaker 8: brain is depressed by multiple drugs, such as happened in
16:54
Speaker 8: this case, in my opinion, the heart and lungs will
16:57
Speaker 8: not function properly.
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Speaker 5: What drugs specifically are we referring to, Doctor? There were
17:03
Speaker 5: several drugs involved here.
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Speaker 8: The principal offender in this case was codeine, which is
17:08
Speaker 8: a pain reliever. but which is known to have a
17:11
Speaker 8: CNS depressant effect.
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Speaker 3: They also interview Elvis' stepbrother, David Stanley. He tells Geraldo
17:18
Speaker 3: he saw Elvis abusing drugs regularly. Another stepbrother, Rick Stanley,
17:23
Speaker 3: says he picked up a prescription for Dilaudid for Elvis
17:27
Speaker 3: the night before he died. And that's where they get
17:30
Speaker 3: into Elvis' history with prescription medications. These were all legally
17:36
Speaker 3: prescribed drugs, albeit potentially over-prescribed. Next, we talk to former
17:43
Speaker 3: LAPD detective John O'Grady. He's interviewed in this 2020 episode,
17:48
Speaker 3: and oh man, the LAPD. There's a name I trust
17:51
Speaker 3: to not be involved in high-level conspiracies involving the American government.
17:55
Speaker 3: He says he frequently worked with Elvis' father, Vernon. to
17:59
Speaker 3: investigate where Elvis was getting his drugs from. This feels
18:03
Speaker 3: like a plot hole in the Geraldo report. They act
18:07
Speaker 3: like where Elvis was getting his drugs from was a
18:09
Speaker 3: mystery to people, while also interviewing people who talk about
18:13
Speaker 3: filling lots and lots of prescriptions for Elvis. If anyone's
18:18
Speaker 3: going to know what doctors were giving him these drugs,
18:21
Speaker 3: it's going to be the people around him who just
18:23
Speaker 3: went and picked up the drugs. I don't understand all
18:26
Speaker 3: of this extra investigative stuff.
18:29
Speaker 2: Work.
18:29
Speaker 3: It feels like they might be trying a little too hard.
18:33
Speaker 3: So what's this LAPD guy's deal, you know? Nevertheless, let's
18:37
Speaker 3: listen to a quote from former LAPD detective John O'Grady.
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Speaker 1: Should his attending physicians have noticed the fact that he
18:45
Speaker 1: was abusing these drugs?
18:48
Speaker 8: He'd either have to be a retarded alligator not to
18:51
Speaker 8: notice that or a totally incompetent medical doctor.
18:55
Speaker 3: Okay, well, fuck that guy. So next, Geraldo starts chatting
18:58
Speaker 3: up the doctors who prescribed Elvis his drugs. One of
19:02
Speaker 3: them being Max Shapiro, who is described as a Dr.
19:07
Speaker 3: Feelgood type, who was known for prescribing narcotics more than
19:11
Speaker 3: most doctors would. He is a dentist who also makes
19:15
Speaker 3: house calls, as dentists often do, I don't think. He
19:20
Speaker 3: says he prescribes medication more than most doctors, but does
19:24
Speaker 3: it out of compassion. And Geraldo asks to see the
19:28
Speaker 3: inside of Dr. Max's silver briefcase, and he says no,
19:32
Speaker 3: but confirms there's a shit ton of drugs in there.
19:34
Speaker 3: It's worth noting, Dr. Max seems like a movie character.
19:39
Speaker 3: This part is weird. I didn't find a whole lot
19:42
Speaker 3: of references to Dr. Max Shapiro outside of this episode.
19:47
Speaker 3: There's a timeline thing on a website that says Lisa
19:50
Speaker 3: Marie took a trip with him in 1973. But that's
19:54
Speaker 3: about it. Granted, I didn't spend an entire day looking
19:58
Speaker 3: for those references or anything like that. But if they're
20:01
Speaker 3: out there, they don't pop up immediately. There's a book
20:05
Speaker 3: out there called Dr. Feelgood. about a doctor who treated Elvis, JFK,
20:09
Speaker 3: a whole bunch of other famous people, but his name
20:12
Speaker 3: was Max Jacobson. Sorry, Dr. Max Jacobson. For whatever reason,
20:17
Speaker 3: despite openly confessing to probably maybe over-prescribing drugs on a
20:23
Speaker 3: national news program, it seems like none of the consequences
20:27
Speaker 3: that befall the next guy we're going to talk about
20:31
Speaker 3: ever come down on Dr. Max's head. I don't know
20:34
Speaker 3: why that is. But next, Geraldo interviews Dr. George Nikopoulos, a.k.a. Dr. Nick.
20:40
Speaker 3: This guy is a pretty notorious figure in Elvis fandom.
20:46
Speaker 3: Good friend of Elvis, his personal physician. Geraldo, we find
20:50
Speaker 3: out from an article that related to this ABC News story,
20:55
Speaker 3: just sort of ambushes Dr. Nick. He shows up at
20:58
Speaker 3: his office and says, hey, you can sit down with
21:01
Speaker 3: me for an interview right now, or I'll wait for
21:04
Speaker 3: you to leave for the day. I'll stick a microphone
21:07
Speaker 3: in your face. You can say no comment, and that's
21:10
Speaker 3: good enough. I'll be able to say whatever I want
21:12
Speaker 3: about you on this ABC News program. So Dr. Nick
21:17
Speaker 3: sits down for an interview with Geraldo, and the One
21:22
Speaker 3: thing that stands out about Dr. Nick compared to Dr. Max,
21:29
Speaker 3: Elvis's dentist, who seems like he was cast to play
21:34
Speaker 3: a drug dealing dentist. When they ask him about prescribing
21:39
Speaker 3: these medications, he knows he did it. So he pushes
21:44
Speaker 3: back with stuff like, well, I don't want people to
21:47
Speaker 3: be in pain. That's my whole thing is I make
21:50
Speaker 3: sure My patients are never in pain. So yeah, I
21:53
Speaker 3: probably over-prescribed. Dr. Nick, on the other hand, vehemently denies
22:00
Speaker 3: that he prescribed drugs to Elvis to the degree that
22:05
Speaker 3: Geraldo is claiming. He's got a soft voice. He seems
22:10
Speaker 3: very nervous, as anyone would probably be if a national
22:15
Speaker 3: news show came to your job and started asking you
22:18
Speaker 3: questions about the deaths of one of the most popular
22:22
Speaker 3: musicians of all time.
22:24
Speaker 6: The records indicate that, especially in the last year of
22:28
Speaker 6: his life, you prescribed certain medications to Elvis Presley in
22:35
Speaker 6: quite extraordinarily large amounts.
22:41
Speaker 5: Why?
22:42
Speaker 7: I can't comment on that, and I don't.
22:49
Speaker 5: Believe that it's true.
22:51
Speaker 6: Well, the records we have, Doctor, and I'll say this
22:55
Speaker 6: as gently as I possibly can, indicate that from January 20th,
23:00
Speaker 6: 1977 until August 16th, 1977, the day he died, you
23:06
Speaker 6: prescribed to Elvis Presley, and the prescriptions are all signed
23:10
Speaker 6: by you, over 5,000 scheduled to narcotics and or amphetamines.
23:21
Speaker 6: comes out to something like 25.
23:25
Speaker 5: Per day i don't believe that.
23:31
Speaker 6: Well is it something that you'd like to refresh your
23:34
Speaker 6: recollection on or is it something that you deny i deny.
23:38
Speaker 3: He sticks to those denials throughout this whole interview he
23:43
Speaker 3: is steadfast in his denial that no he did not
23:47
Speaker 3: prescribe as many drugs as Geraldo is claiming. Before we
23:53
Speaker 3: get into that more, let's just take a quick break
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Speaker 3: Bic fucking pens. You can strap them to a jackhammer.
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Speaker 3: That's not actually our sponsor. That commercial was just left
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Speaker 3: in this video. And, oh, I'm so happy it was.
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Speaker 3: Have you ever seen a Bic Pen shot out of
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Speaker 3: a gun?
24:33
Speaker 5: I have.
24:34
Speaker 3: It's in this video. Anyway, let's get to one of
24:37
Speaker 3: Geraldo's complaints that is almost completely glossed over here. Here goes.
24:41
Speaker 2: Item.
24:42
Speaker 1: All the photographs taken of the death scene, all the
24:45
Speaker 1: notes of the medical examiner's investigator, and all of the
24:47
Speaker 1: toxicological reports allegedly prepared by the medical examiner are missing
24:52
Speaker 1: from the official files.
24:53
Speaker 3: That's convenient. No pictures of the death scene. No pictures
24:57
Speaker 3: of the autopsy. What an unfortunate but surely accidental miscarriage.
25:04
Speaker 3: of proper procedure. There's also this guy.
25:06
Speaker 8: Item.
25:07
Speaker 1: Officials of the county government believe there's been a cover-up.
25:11
Speaker 7: The Elvis mystique completely pervades the Memphis area. And if
25:16
Speaker 7: there are individuals who are so concerned with the mystique
25:20
Speaker 7: that they do not care to know the truth, then
25:23
Speaker 7: I feel that somewhere along the way, someone has to
25:26
Speaker 7: take it upon himself to see that the truth.
25:28
Speaker 5: Is brought up. But you definitely feel there's a cover-up?
25:31
Speaker 5: I'm positive about that.
25:33
Speaker 3: That one is important. That's Dr. Vasco Smith, and he
25:36
Speaker 3: is confident that there was a cover-up of some sort
25:39
Speaker 3: happening in the death of Elvis. He actually comes up
25:43
Speaker 3: in Gail Brewer Giorgio's book. He was approached years later
25:47
Speaker 3: by an outlet that was looking into claims of a
25:52
Speaker 3: cover-up of some sort in Elvis Presley's death. And when
25:55
Speaker 3: they ask him about Elvis, first he says, I was
25:59
Speaker 3: more of a jazz fan, which I like that. And
26:02
Speaker 3: then they're like, no, no, no, no, no. We're asking
26:05
Speaker 3: about the cover-up. You said that thing on the ABC
26:08
Speaker 3: 2020 report. And Dr. Vasco Smith is like, nah, I'm
26:13
Speaker 3: not talking about that anymore. And people not wanting to
26:17
Speaker 3: talk specifically about this ABC 2020 report weirdly is going
26:21
Speaker 3: to become a pattern. And I know we love a
26:24
Speaker 3: pattern on the internet these days, right? And for good reason.
26:27
Speaker 3: Very helpfully, the video I'm watching, which I will link to,
26:31
Speaker 3: tags a follow-up report from a later episode about the
26:36
Speaker 3: indictment of the aforementioned Dr.
26:39
Speaker 8: Nick.
26:40
Speaker 3: Several years later, he was finally indicted in the death
26:43
Speaker 3: of Elvis Presley. I say several years later. It was three.
26:47
Speaker 3: It was 1980. I want to point out here that
26:49
Speaker 3: when I'm covering a documentary or a news report like this,
26:54
Speaker 3: I take notes as I watch. And sometimes my notes
26:58
Speaker 3: include my hunches as to where things might be going.
27:02
Speaker 3: I bring that up only to mention that my first
27:05
Speaker 3: note after watching that part of the 2020 report was this.
27:09
Speaker 3: Here's a quote from my own notes. This guy would
27:12
Speaker 3: have been really easy to set up as part of
27:14
Speaker 3: a fake death plot, end quote. So here's the thing.
27:18
Speaker 3: A lot of what has developed with this case in
27:20
Speaker 3: the years since, all of what I'm talking about right
27:23
Speaker 3: now centers around what we didn't know back in the 1970s.
27:28
Speaker 3: And what's a thing that we didn't quite know as
27:32
Speaker 3: well in the 70s that we all pretty much know now?
27:35
Speaker 3: It's that the police are quite often quite shady. They
27:40
Speaker 3: were back then. They are now. We just didn't have
27:43
Speaker 3: the video evidence to prove it back then. And yeah,
27:46
Speaker 3: we kind of did even then, too. That's another episode.
27:50
Speaker 3: Let's listen to Geraldo's thoughts on the prosecution's case here.
27:54
Speaker 1: So almost three years after the death of Elvis Presley,
27:57
Speaker 1: his longtime personal physician has finally been indicted, in part because.
28:01
Speaker 5: Of the way he cared for his famous patient.
28:04
Speaker 3: If convicted, Dr.
28:05
Speaker 1: Nikopoulos would face between two and ten years in prison
28:08
Speaker 1: for each of the 14 counts. And ABC News has
28:11
Speaker 1: learned that the prosecution feels the case against him is airtight.
28:16
Speaker 3: Okay, interesting. And why does he think that case is airtight?
28:21
Speaker 3: Here's another clip.
28:22
Speaker 1: For instance, in April and again in July of 1977, Dr.
28:26
Speaker 1: Nick's medical bag was reported stolen. After the contents had
28:30
Speaker 1: been taken, the bags were recovered by the police. Before
28:33
Speaker 1: returning the bag to the doctor, the police apparently copied
28:36
Speaker 1: down his schedules for dispensing drugs to Elvis Presley. In
28:40
Speaker 1: other words, from the doctor's own notes found inside his
28:44
Speaker 1: own medical bag. The state knows exactly what he gave
28:47
Speaker 1: to Elvis and when.
28:49
Speaker 3: Okay. Let's be honest. The police stole those bags, right?
28:52
Speaker 3: Or at the very least, they had those bags stolen.
28:55
Speaker 3: In the lead up to one of the biggest conspiracy
28:58
Speaker 3: theories of all time, the police magically recovered a bag
29:02
Speaker 3: of stolen narcotics from the doctor at the center of
29:06
Speaker 3: all this twice within the span of three months. And
29:10
Speaker 3: before they return it to him, they crack it open
29:13
Speaker 3: and write down, Everything it says about Elvis. I understand
29:17
Speaker 3: that this was an instantly accepted detail that elicited zero
29:21
Speaker 3: scrutiny in the late 70s when Barney Miller ruled the airwaves.
29:26
Speaker 3: But it is 2K goddamn 24. We know how the
29:29
Speaker 3: cops do. If anyone could have been enlisted to plant
29:35
Speaker 3: evidence in a scheme to fake Elvis's death, it is
29:39
Speaker 3: literally any cop. in the 70s. And no shit, this
29:42
Speaker 3: is presented as conclusive proof that this guy over-prescribed Elvis
29:48
Speaker 3: a shit ton of drugs. Are you skeptical? You should
29:51
Speaker 3: be for a few reasons. For one thing, Dr. Nick
29:54
Speaker 3: was acquitted when this finally went to a criminal trial. Twice.
29:58
Speaker 3: He was acquitted twice. twice. So that should give you
30:02
Speaker 3: some pause just on the surface. But also consider this.
30:06
Speaker 3: We're talking about the doctor who was accused of killing Elvis.
30:11
Speaker 3: And he went on trial in Elvis's home state and
30:16
Speaker 3: a jury acquitted him twice. You think the people of
30:21
Speaker 3: Tennessee wouldn't have loved to send Dr. Nick straight to
30:25
Speaker 3: hell for murdering Elvis Presley? Sure they would, but they didn't.
30:30
Speaker 3: And I promise you it's not because of Dr. Nick's
30:32
Speaker 3: personality and joie de vivre. Also, I found an article
30:37
Speaker 3: from Memphis Magazine. From back in the day, where they
30:40
Speaker 3: interview the ABC producers behind this Geraldo report, I'll link
30:44
Speaker 3: to it. It reveals some highly interesting details that you
30:48
Speaker 3: don't see in that 2020 report. It was published while Dr.
30:52
Speaker 3: Nick was before the medical board in Tennessee to decide
30:56
Speaker 3: if he got to keep his medical license. For what
30:58
Speaker 3: it's worth, despite the claims that he basically murdered Elvis
31:01
Speaker 3: through medical negligence, his license was eventually suspended for all
31:06
Speaker 3: of three months that time. In 1995, they eventually took
31:10
Speaker 3: it for good. Look, I'm not saying Dr. Nick didn't.
31:13
Speaker 3: didn't over-prescribe drugs, okay? But what's interesting about this article
31:18
Speaker 3: is that it gets into some of the behind-the-scenes details
31:21
Speaker 3: of that Geraldo report. That article is called How ABC
31:24
Speaker 3: Unearthed the Elvis Story by Tom Martin, writing for Memphis Magazine.
31:30
Speaker 3: We'll link to it. They interviewed two ABC producers, Charlie
31:33
Speaker 3: Thompson and James Cole. They both claimed that when a
31:36
Speaker 3: local reporter named E.B. Blackburn, who wrote for a Memphis
31:39
Speaker 3: outlet called Commercial Appeal, which still exists, it's a USA
31:43
Speaker 3: Today property, found out that they had copies of Elvis'
31:47
Speaker 3: toxicology report, Cole and Thompson both claimed he called and
31:50
Speaker 3: told them that there was nothing to see there, Elvis
31:53
Speaker 3: didn't die of drugs, and hey, you should just, you know,
31:56
Speaker 3: destroy those reports before... Those irresponsible folks from the New
32:01
Speaker 3: York Times and the BBC come to town. But here's
32:04
Speaker 3: the thing.
32:04
Speaker 4: E.B.
32:05
Speaker 3: Blackburn denies that in the very next paragraph. Here's a quote.
32:13
Speaker 3: And I certainly never called anyone irresponsible. I have no
32:17
Speaker 3: desire to get into any dispute with ABC or any
32:21
Speaker 3: other arm of the media. We pursued the story as
32:24
Speaker 3: far as we could go at the time. We were
32:27
Speaker 3: the first news agency to ever hint that drugs were involved.
32:31
Speaker 3: We did print that toxicology data and we tried to
32:35
Speaker 3: get the autopsy. But we ran into all the walls
32:38
Speaker 3: that everyone else has since run into. I'm satisfied that
32:42
Speaker 3: we pursued the story at the time as far as
32:45
Speaker 3: we could. I can't begin to tell you why ABC
32:49
Speaker 3: developed such a late interest in it. End quote. Hmm.
32:55
Speaker 3: So this comes down to a matter of who do
32:58
Speaker 3: you believe? Geraldo Rivera and these two ABC News producers
33:03
Speaker 3: who sort of imply that local reporter E.B. Blackburn is
33:09
Speaker 3: at least incompetent in his coverage of this story, if
33:14
Speaker 3: not maybe involved in a cover up of this story.
33:18
Speaker 3: Do you believe that or do you believe E.B. Blackburn is?
33:21
Speaker 3: When he says, no, we published it and it wasn't
33:24
Speaker 3: as newsworthy as you think, because that's a big discrepancy.
33:28
Speaker 3: Charlie Thompson and James Cole, on top of claiming that E.B.
33:34
Speaker 3: Blackburn tried to shut down. Geraldo's reporting on this toxicology report,
33:40
Speaker 3: they also claim that the outlet he worked for never
33:43
Speaker 3: published it, as if to imply that they had it,
33:46
Speaker 3: but just kind of sat on it for what? To
33:49
Speaker 3: hide the fact that drugs were involved in Elvis's death?
33:52
Speaker 3: But if they did publish it, that blows up Geraldo's
33:55
Speaker 3: theory entirely. And then the very next paragraph, we get
33:59
Speaker 3: this quote. This is directly from the article. Here goes.
34:03
Speaker 3: Beth Tamke, who has since been reassigned to the paper's
34:06
Speaker 3: Action Please column, refuses to discuss the matter now. I've
34:10
Speaker 3: kept my mouth shut for three years, and I'm not
34:13
Speaker 3: going to start talking now, she says. I'm an employee here,
34:17
Speaker 3: and I fulfill my duties, and that's as far as
34:20
Speaker 3: I go, end quote. So there's that. It seems like
34:24
Speaker 3: people at this paper did report on it. They did
34:28
Speaker 3: all the things they were supposed to do in pursuit
34:31
Speaker 3: of this story, and then ABC News comes to town
34:35
Speaker 3: and one, decides this story is a way bigger deal
34:38
Speaker 3: than it is. And two, starts telling local news outlets
34:42
Speaker 3: that commercial appeal dropped the ball when it comes to
34:45
Speaker 3: reporting on the death of Elvis. And so again, it
34:48
Speaker 3: comes down to who do you trust? Which brings us
34:50
Speaker 3: back to the Dr. Nick story. interview. This article also
34:55
Speaker 3: reveals that there might have been some trickery involved there.
34:59
Speaker 3: Here's a direct quote from the article. I'm sorry, it's
35:02
Speaker 3: a little bit long. Rivera then pulled out a scrap
35:04
Speaker 3: of paper about the size of a prescription form. He
35:08
Speaker 3: asked once more if Nicopolis was sure he hadn't prescribed
35:12
Speaker 3: huge doses of narcotics to Presley. Nickopoulos said nothing. As
35:18
Speaker 3: Cole later described it, I believe Dr. Nick thought Geraldo
35:21
Speaker 3: was actually holding a prescription. In fact, he still believes
35:25
Speaker 3: to this day that we brought stolen prescriptions with us
35:29
Speaker 3: to the interview. He never asked Geraldo if the piece
35:31
Speaker 3: of paper was a prescription. If he had, I don't
35:34
Speaker 3: think Geraldo would have lied about it. But Geraldo did
35:36
Speaker 3: ask the questions with great authority and insistence. I can
35:40
Speaker 3: see how Nicopolis could have had the impression that we
35:43
Speaker 3: had some prescriptions with us. End quote. And again, Dr.
35:48
Speaker 3: Nick is indeed very insistent that he did not prescribe
35:51
Speaker 3: drugs to Elvis in the manner that Geraldo is claiming.
35:55
Speaker 3: And I just want to remind people, that we eventually
35:58
Speaker 3: found out that the details about how often he prescribed
36:02
Speaker 3: drugs to Elvis comes from what the police claim they
36:05
Speaker 3: found when they recovered his stolen bag and wrote down
36:09
Speaker 3: what was in his notes twice in the span of
36:13
Speaker 3: three months. Another reminder, the ultimate claim here is Elvis
36:17
Speaker 3: joined witness protection. If that happened and death by combination
36:21
Speaker 3: of bad living and too many drugs is your cover story,
36:25
Speaker 3: planning evidence on Dr. Nick during those two stolen bag
36:29
Speaker 3: incidents that happened a few short months prior to Elvis
36:32
Speaker 3: dying would not be impossible at all. And I suspect
36:36
Speaker 3: that might have a lot to do with why he
36:39
Speaker 3: was acquitted. You know, we talk all the time about
36:41
Speaker 3: how true crime types love to parrot that police talking
36:45
Speaker 3: point that there's no such thing as a coincidence when
36:48
Speaker 3: you're talking about crime.
36:50
Speaker 4: Dr.
36:50
Speaker 3: Nick getting his bag stolen twice in three months and
36:54
Speaker 3: having it recovered both times by spy cops is not
36:59
Speaker 3: a coincidence. At least I have a hard time believing
37:02
Speaker 3: it's a coincidence. I said this about the Orion book
37:05
Speaker 3: last week, and I'll say it about Dr. Nick this week.
37:08
Speaker 3: I don't know what the fuck is going on with Dr. Nick,
37:11
Speaker 3: but something the fuck is going on with Dr.
37:13
Speaker 2: Nick.
37:14
Speaker 3: Maybe or maybe not. Again, I will reiterate what I
37:18
Speaker 3: said about this 2020 report at the top of the episode.
37:21
Speaker 3: If Elvis died in 1977, this is probably just good
37:25
Speaker 3: journalism that was aided in large part by questionable law
37:29
Speaker 3: enforcement activities. If Elvis did cooperate with the FBI on
37:34
Speaker 3: an investigation into a criminal syndicate called the fraternity and
37:39
Speaker 3: then fake his death so he could join witness protection,
37:41
Speaker 3: I think it's at least possible that this 2020 report
37:44
Speaker 3: is a part of that because it certainly shifted all
37:48
Speaker 3: of the public attention and controversy about a coverup in
37:52
Speaker 3: Elvis's death Not to, did he fake his death, which
37:56
Speaker 3: is a thing people were also talking about a whole
37:58
Speaker 3: lot back when it happened, but instead to, no, no, no, no,
38:01
Speaker 3: we're sure he died. We just want to know how.
38:04
Speaker 3: We disagree on how he died. That's definitely going to
38:07
Speaker 3: deflect the attention you want it to deflect. And the
38:10
Speaker 3: best part is that we will never, never, ever, ever,
38:14
Speaker 3: ever know. I should mention that those tabloid articles out
38:17
Speaker 3: there that claim to know what's in the Elvis autopsy report,
38:20
Speaker 3: the quotes in those come from a guy named Dan Worley.
38:23
Speaker 3: who was chief investigator for the Tennessee office of the
38:27
Speaker 3: state chief medical examiner. Here's a quote. Presley's chronic constipation,
38:32
Speaker 3: the result of years of prescription drug abuse and high fat,
38:36
Speaker 3: high cholesterol gorging, brought on what's known as Valsalva's maneuver.
38:42
Speaker 3: Put simply, the strain of attempting to defecate compressed the
38:46
Speaker 3: singer's abdominal aorta, shutting down his heart. End quote. And oh, hey,
38:51
Speaker 3: look at that. Everyone's right. It was a heart attack
38:55
Speaker 3: caused by constipation, which was caused by drug abuse. That's
38:59
Speaker 3: if he really died, of course. On next week's episode,
39:03
Speaker 3: I'm going to wrap things up by tagging Gail Brewer-Giorgio
39:06
Speaker 3: back in for the rubber match and diving into her
39:10
Speaker 3: mysteriously hard-to-find 1997 book, Elvis is Alive. It covers an
39:16
Speaker 3: FBI investigation called Operation Fountain Pen. and her suspicion that
39:21
Speaker 3: Elvis was a cooperating witness in that investigation and faked
39:25
Speaker 3: his death to join witness protection. We already talked about
39:29
Speaker 3: it a little bit on. an older episode of the pod,
39:31
Speaker 3: where we also get into some of the various clues
39:34
Speaker 3: and sightings over the years that point to Elvis maybe
39:38
Speaker 3: living a little longer than we all thought. Give that
39:41
Speaker 3: a listen to prep for next week's Elvis finale. If
39:43
Speaker 3: you want, I'll link to it in the show notes.
39:46
Speaker 3: And hey, that's it. Thanks, everybody. We love you.
39:52
Speaker 2: People of earth your planet is about to be destroyed
40:00
Speaker 8: Your planet is about to be destroyed