What became of the guys who tried to steal Elvis?

Cecil replies:

Dear Barbara:

I shudder to think what you may be contemplating, but the Elvis kidnapping case doesn’t offer a very strong deterrent against body snatching. The charges against the three men who allegedly tried to swipe Presley’s body were dropped by the Memphis prosecutor when the chief witness and accuser (legalese for “rat”), one Ronnie Lee Adkins, demonstrated his unreliability by getting himself arrested for fraud. Adkins apparently had checked into Memphis’s Doctor’s Hospital posing as a policeman in order to claim that he was covered by the city’s insurance plan.

Following the attempted theft, Elvis’s body was moved beyond the reach of would-be defilers and into a corner of his Graceland estate, which Vernon Presley, Elvis’s father christened a high-security “Meditation Garden.” In addition to plots for Elvis and his mother, the senior Presley thoughtfully laid aside space for Elvis’s grandmother, two uncles, and himself. Vernon died in 1979 at the age of 63, and I presume he’s now keeping company with his son.

Cecil Adams

Send questions to Cecil via cecil@straightdope.com.