Gary James' Interview With
Wanda June Berry Hill



Is Elvis Alive? Wanda June Berry Hill says it could be true!

She knew Elvis for fifteen years, first meeting him on the movie set of Kissin' Cousins. She is the author of the book "We Remember Elvis". Her name is Wanda June Berry Hill. Does Wanda believe Elvis is alive? She told us, "It could be true!"

Q - Wanda, up until recently, you believed that Elvis had died on August 16th, 1977. You now endorse Linda Hood Sigmon and her website. What changed your mind? Do you believe that Elvis faked his death?

A - Yes. I would not say 100%, but 99% I think so. Things have occurred since then where I've not had vocal communications with him, but he has responded. He's sent me gifts. He's sent me notes. It is his handwriting. I think he did what he did in order to survive. That is my feeling.

Q - If he had some serious health problems, how would he have done that?

A - Very easily. He could've gone to Sweden and had 'em take care of. (laughs)

Q - You're telling me there were better doctors in Sweden at the time than in the United States?

A - Absolutely. There always has been and still is.

Q - Why would Elvis go to all the trouble to fake his death and then turn around and correspond with you and Linda Hood Sigmon?

A - Well, he's not being really public. He's talking to someone else. That way he doesn't have to come out to do it. He can communicate without giving himself away. He always talked about how he was really depressed in his last few years and he wanted a way to escape. He didn't just want to die and that would be it. He knew he was going to die if he didn't get medical help. To get the medical help he'd have to have, he would have to give up his career. The press would've just torn him up from one end to another. That's what he thought and it's probably true. So, I believe the person I have communicated with is him mainly because of his handwriting and the way he writes and the way he thinks. Therefore I believe he's still alive, but he no longer is Elvis Presley. He lives the life he would've lived had he not been a celebrity. Of course, he still has access to lots of money because there's a lot of investments in his name. You can go online and look those up. Somebody has put his money in good places where he will never have to worry about that. I think he's still around.

Q - How would you stop doctors in Sweden from talking about their famous patient, Elvis Presley?

A - (laughs) I guess that money can do anything and then he didn't do it in the United States. There are altruistic people out there in the world who will keep their mouths shut about some things. He had a lot of good people that didn't sell him out. Put it that way.

Q - I did an interview with Charles Stone, who worked for Concerts West, the company that promoted Elvis' concerts. He said that only eight people were part of Elvis' inner circle. So, the stories that came out about Elvis were third party stories. So, if you're surrounded by eight loyal people, I suppose it would be possible to fake your death.

A - Yeah, it's possible.

Q - Although, you just have to wonder if one of those eight people would've told someone by now. But they never have.

A - Well, I know that. Howard Hughes, who was a very good friend of Elvis', did it and he had seven more years of life un-bothered by the press or anybody else. He managed to get out by faking his death. It can be done. So, I haven't spoke to him (Elvis) personally and hear his voice say anything to me. (laughs) If I did, I would know positively it was him. But I'm inclined to believe it is (him). He's given me information through Linda Sigmon that no one but him and I would know. For instance, the very first thing he said when I said do you really know it's him? She said, "He told me to tell you if I ever question her to tell me that I have the bag." And that was one of the things we had discussed while he was still here, before he "died." He had to have colon surgery to remove his big colon and he would've had to have had a bag. That's what he feared the most because he couldn't be Elvis Presley and have something like that. That's why he chose either death or life and I believe he chose life in the fact that he told her (Linda Hood Sigmon) to tell me that. I have the bag and I would know what he was talking about, and I do absolutely know. It wasn't something that he told just everybody about, that he had that problem. Most people didn't have a clue except for the few times he had to run off the stage. He was getting so he couldn't stay out on the stage in that forum. It was very stressful doing that. He would leave the stage to go to the bathroom. He would change his clothes sometimes. He was just beside himself over that. You can imagine how horrible he would've felt if he hadn't gotten off the stage in time. But anyway, it's all a long, big story. I don't have any positive proof evidence to give anybody about it. So people who write things, they write it on their own. I have answered questions for a few people, but that's all I know really. I don't know where he is. I don't know how he is except that I know he's still out there somewhere. I'm almost positive of that. And I know that his family knows. He had plenty of places he could go and have a life. You know, no problem.

Q - So you're saying Elvis' daughter Lisa Marie and Priscilla know?

A - Oh, I'm sure.

Q - How about the bodyguards like Sonny West and Red West?

A - Oh, I don't think so. He didn't trust them.

Q - So, they just continue to say he passed away on August 16, 1977.

A - Yeah. They weren't included in it. Anything they didn't have their fingers in didn't exist. That's the way it was around him.

Q - Did the gifts Elvis sent you have a return address on the box?

A - No. He has a go-between. He has somebody that he trusts implicitly. Very few people know how to communicate with him. They go through that person who then passes on anything that goes between them that he sends or they send, whatever. He has somebody else in-between him and the world. He doesn't live like a poor man. He's got money, but he doesn't export anything. He devotes himself mainly to trying to be beneficial to the people he comes across and the world in general. You can go online and find all kinds of investments under TCB Enterprises and Elvis Presley Incorporated.

Q - So, the "why" would Elvis fake his death would be because of his health then?

A - Yes. And if you want to know just how bad off he was, take a look at that last concert he did. He was a sick man. His face was puffy. He looked fat. I didn't know if he was going to make it, survive it or not. He knew he had to do something or he was going to die. He had no choice.

Q - Did you see the Geraldo special on Fox News recently, Elvis At 80?

A - Oh, that piece of flap? (laughs)

Q - The idea that Elvis was taking thousands of pills still makes no sense to me. How could a man then rehearse, record and tour? If the idea is put out that the people surrounding him, employed to protect him, are using those pills, that really makes no sense.

A - Those guys, if he took a vitamin pill, he was taking drugs. When I first met him, it was on the set of Kissin' Cousins. When he was there, this guy came and brought him five or six pills and he took 'em just before he had lunch. I said, "Are those vitamins or what?" They looked like vitamins to me. He said, "Some of them are vitamins." It was like he was borderline diabetic. Before he ate, he took his medication to help him with his sugar problem that he had. That's true. I may have been one of the first persons he ever told that he was almost a diabetic, other than Mary Tyler Moore. She knew. But she was the same thing. She had to take medication to stay alive. Anyway, he did take those pills, quite a few of them. I questioned him, "Are those all vitamins?" I was thinking the top of your head is going to blow off, you're going to be so keyed up taking that many vitamins. And he explained to me what each one of them was. He didn't hide it. He had two for pain because he had back issues and the hip issue due to his activity on stage. He was so funny. He looked at me and said, "Due to all the activity on stage." (laughs) I had to laugh. That was the first time I realized he had a really good sense of humor because what activity did he have? He was just wide open. He didn't hide anything. He was probably less secretive. He should've been because he just trusted people. He got into a lot of trouble for it too.

Q - Did Elvis ever talk about the Colonel ripping him off?

A - Well, he took 50% of everything and sometimes he took more than 50%. Elvis thought without Colonel Parker he would never have been anybody. Parker knew how to exploit. He recognized him as a unique talent. He had the looks, the voice, personality, everything. So, he made him what he was and that's fact. Elvis would never have been who he was without him and he knew that. He did get 50% of everything and that was the deal. Elvis never changed it. It was never put in writing.

Q - When you really think about it, who besides Colonel Parker could have managed Elvis?

A - I know. It had to be somebody that could see into the future and had a vision. Even though Colonel Parker tended to be old fashioned 'cause in the end Elvis got bigger than he could manage, it created some issues between them, but not a lot. Elvis didn't know any better either. His mother was pretty smart. She thought Parker was taking advantage of her son and in some ways he probably did, but he still became who he was.

Q - But Elvis did alright for himself.

A - Elvis told me when he met Colonel Parker he said, "I was as dumb as an orange peel." (laughs)

Q - Or, how about what Colonel Parker said, "When I met Elvis he had a million dollars worth of talent. Now he has a million dollars."

A - More than that.

Q - I know. At the time he said it, it was funny.

A - Yeah. I know. It all worked out. It was meant to be. It was just one of those things. In every lifetime, in every generation, there's somebody that comes along that's going to stand out and everybody remembers them. They become important. In our generation it was Elvis. There were others that came along that did different things, but he was the biggest in every way. There's nobody even doing some other type of career that did any better.

Q - Larry Geller believes that had Elvis lived, he would've pursued a serious acting career. Charles Stone believes a film without Elvis singing in it would never have worked. Audiences would have stayed away.

A - That's not true 'cause it was Elvis. They would ave gone just to sit in the chair and look at him. I really believe that people were fascinated with this guy. He was the one person in that generation to do it.

Q - Was Elvis fascinating off stage?

A - He was very interesting in that he was totally different than you would expect him to be considering his image and what he came up supposedly doing, how he made it. He was very religious. He loved to read spiritual books. He read history books that were way over my head, stuff that I wouldn't even bother to look at, but he was into all that kind of stuff. He was very, very self-educated. He probably could have passed any college test there was 'cause he studied, he read. Every spare minute, he always had a book in his hand or carried one around with him. The guys bitched 'cause they had to haul his books around for him, a truck load of books. Pretty heavy. Sometimes they would leave some behind on purpose. He would make them get on the plane and go back and find them. (laughs)

Q - To the hotel room?

A - Yeah. They'd leave 'em. They'd get sick and tired of hauling these big books around. It was crazy, those stupid guys that were around him. He kept those people around. He paid them well. He looked after their families 'cause he didn't think they'd make it any other way and that's about the truth. I don't think they would have either.

Q - Elvis had the best life and they had the second best life.

A - Well, if you asked them he never paid them enough. He never gave them a decent salary. He paid them a flat salary. Everybody got pretty much the same except Joe Esposito got a little more 'cause he would ask for a raise. The others didn't. Elvis looked after them in every way possible. Their families always had money. He always gave money to their wives. Instead of giving the guys extra, he took it to their wives. He didn't trust 'em to do right with the money and they probably wouldn't have. He did everything any father figure would do because they were more like his spoiled brats than they were workers for him.

Q - Elvis earned between one hundred and two hundred million dollars from 1956 to 1977. Given that he was generous to his employees, where did all his money go?

A - He spent it. He gave it away. He spent it on other people. His dad wasn't really good at handling money. There was more money than he knew what to do with all along. He didn't invest it very well. When Priscilla stepped in and started investing, his value has stayed up there pretty high. He has money only because she was involved. I will giver her that. She did help in that regard and she helped his dad the same way, by looking after the money and saved Graceland. He was thinking there in those last days from all I've ever heard from people who were around and knew, Vernon was on the verge of selling Graceland. He was selling things off because he didn't know how else to make any money. He didn't know how he was going to afford to keep it all, so he was just going to start selling stuff. That's what would've happened if Priscilla hadn't stepped in and took over. In that regard it was a good thing.

Q - Here's what someone in law enforcement told me: "What most people don't realize is that if any person knowingly allows the public to believe they died, and were buried, cremated or whatever, that person would end up in prison for violating a number of state and federal statutes. If that person was wealthy or famous, the lawsuits filed by fans, family members, children, wives, ex-wives, or anyone who lost money or suffered sufficient emotional trauma would be staggering. Many people fake their own deaths every year, but those are people who are already in trouble with the law, trying to escape debtors or trying to leave their families and boring lives to start over in some remote area of the country." To me, that means Elvis could never come out of hiding and say "I'm really alive," because he would face lawsuits. A few people did die in front of Graceland waiting to get in to see his body. The families of the people that died would probably be the first in line to sue him.

A - If you're going to do something like that, you don't think of anybody killing themselves over it, but it could've happened. There was no body that was verified as being him unless you want to call a wax dummy. Colonel Parker would've had his fingers in that if it were true that he did all of that. Parker would've set all that up himself. There were some people who were killed. Two or three girls. I don't remember now. That was really weird because some psychic lady he knew told him that when he died, told him to be careful. She said, "When you die, be careful because possibly you're going to take three lives with you." It was so strange because three girls were mowed down on the street out there and they died. So, he took three girls with him. He used to joke about that. He's gonna have a big coffin 'cause he's gonna have to have room for a couple of girls with him. He ain't going alone. (laughs) It was funny, but in the end it was not funny at all. I thought he died. I hope that he didn't, but there was so much he'd have to deal with if he did fake his death, I don't see how he could do it. Well, he didn't have to. Somebody else did it for him.

Q - So when the news came on, on August 16th, 1977 that Elvis had died, you believed Elvis died.

A - I did, yes.

Q - And up until you went to Linda's website, you believed that Elvis had died.

A - Well, there were things before that, that made me wonder. There were things that happened along the line. Even his little daughter when she was small kind of flubbed up one time. She knew that her father didn't die. I didn't know for sure then. I thought he did, but she made a comment and then when she was older she made a comment but she managed to correct it then because she was older and knew how. I tend to believe there were people that knew. And he's not the only one who's done it. Howard Hughes did it. Seven years he managed to survive and have a normal life. If you got the money and the people behind you, I guess you can do it. I know Elvis was really tired. He was sick. He knew he was gonna die. He had to get help. You know the media would've just ripped him to shreds if he hadn't left the scene 'cause he was going down.

Q - They were doing it to him at the end.

A - I know.

Q - I recall reading something in Rolling Stone that said he was on stage and said, "When you gotta go, you gotta go," or words to that effect. They compared his decline to that of Judy Garland.

A - I was there for that show. A couple of times he had to leave the stage. One time he had to leave the stage 'cause he was going through stomach problems and he was throwing up constantly. He had to go behind the curtain and throw up several times. So yeah, we were there a lot to see his shows. There were a lot of things that went on. He knew he had to do something. His guts were a mess. The doctors told him it's going to kill you if you don't get surgery and the operation wasn't going to be nice. He didn't want to have the bag, but that's one thing he told me after everything. I realized maybe he is alive. Maybe what I'm thinking is true. Linda told me he said to tell you something because she never said a word about him actually being alive to me. I didn't follow her on line until the last year or so. She told me he said to tell you: I know he told me this 'cause then I would believe him that it was really true, "Tell her I have the bag." And that's what she told me. She said "I have a message and I have to give it to you." I said "What kind of message?" And she said "I have to tell you because he said if I told you, you would know." And that's what she told me.

Q - Now, does he still have the bag today? I believe they can reverse that procedure these days.

A - Well, in his case, they took his entire colon out, his big colon is totally gone. So the little colon doesn't do that kind of work. He doesn't have to wear a bag. The new ones can be turned on and off.

Q - I just thought they could now reverse a situation like that.

A - No. His colon was deformed. He was a twin. It was huge in one area where it shouldn't have been. It would've killed him eventually if he didn't have surgery like they do, that could fix it if he did long ago. So, I think he chose to be dead. He had a better life dead than he did alive in a lot of ways.

Q - If law enforcement sees Linda Hood Sigmon's website, why are they not investigating?

A - Because it's Elvis and he was a very big law enforcement fan. He even had his own badges and took the training and the whole bit to get the badges. They weren't just given to him. He was everything he said he was. He could arrest you if you needed to be arrested legally and he did it. He wanted to be more than just a singer, that's all. Nobody is going to mess with him. He's an official law enforcement officer. So he couldn't get into trouble doing anything there. He's also got credentials for drug stuff; I mean to go into drug investigations. He could do that at any time and quit, legally. I don't think anybody is gonna mess with him.

Q - Would you expect at some point he would give you a call or send a photo of himself to you?

A - I don't think he will because he knows he doesn't have to, and I don't really want that responsibility. What I'm telling you is my theory, my belief. I have no proof that I can visibly hand out and say, "Here he is!" But there is a picture of him and Benjamin, his grandson and that's a real picture. And that was taken in 1994. He was dead a long time before then. If they want proof, there it is. That's all the proof he's ever gonna give 'em I'll bet you.

Q - Obviously Elvis has to be using another name. Should the day come when he really dies (?), how is that going to be kept a secret?

A - Well, I don't know. Maybe he plans to live forever. I don't know. I hope he doesn't die in my lifetime. I won't have to figure it out. But anyway, he uses the name Jesse. He doesn't use Elvis. His name is Jesse. I hope that he has a good life and that he's happy. I know he travels a lot. I know he gets involved with a lot of stuff for television. He had a little bit to do with the movie Avatar. His name is not used, at least that I've ever found. Sometimes if you can find the teeny, tiny print, you'll see TCB Enterprises or Elvis Enterprises or EP. You'll find some little hint, but he doesn't put his name on anything.



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