For Dr. Nichopoulos and his supporters/apologists, the writing of large numbers of prescriptions for large numbers of medications was simply part of the care he provided Elvis and the many people who were part of the concert tours. That is, Dr. Nichopoulos wrote prescriptions for a lot of medications so that they would be available on the tour, in case he needed to treat someone with a medication and could not obtain that medication out on the road. These same folks also defend the doctor’s stockpiling of the medications that were stored at and distributed from the Henley trailer on the back lot at Graceland, saying that these drugs (as part of the infamous “packets”/”attacks”) were simply sleep medications, and that Dr. Nichopoulos and Nurse Henley closely monitored and controlled these medications. So they use a 2-prong defense of Nichopoulos: the massive amounts of drugs were for the tours, and the medications stored with Henley were for sleep. They further claim that the Henley trailer drug stash was also for Vernon Presley and Minnie Mae Presley, Elvis’s father and grandmother, as they (Vernon and MM) were also under Dr. Nichopoulos’s care, but unless Vernon was using Demerol and Percodan on a regular basis, and Minnie Mae was trying to drop a few pounds for summer with handfuls of Dexedrine, we’ll just discount that silly claim right out of the gate.
Elvis’s last tour ended on June 26, 1977, and his next tour was scheduled to begin on August 17, 1977, giving Elvis roughly a 6-week break. If we go back and look at the prescriptions Dr. Nichopoulos wrote in Elvis’s name during that time period, though, we find a lot of pain medication and a lot of sedatives, in addition to Dexedrine, which we can assume Elvis used for staying awake and/or trying to lose weight. But either way, there was no tour in July, and no reason to stockpile these medications. Right? So let’s look at the prescriptions written in Elvis’s name in July 1977 (from the 2nd to the 25th, 24 days inclusive), with no tour on the books and no one else so provide this type of medical support for:
Dexedrine (stimulant) 15mg/24 pills
Dexedrine 5mg/50 pills
Percodan (for mod/sev pain, narcotic)/24 pills
Quaalude 300mg (sedative)/30 pills
Dexedrine 15mg/50 pills
Dexedrine 5mg/100 pills
Percodan/50 pills
Quaalude 300mg/100 pills
Demerol (narcotic) Inj. 100mg/cc/20cc
Dilaudid (narcotic) Inj. 2mg/cc/20cc
Percodan/24 pills
Quaalude 300mg/50 pills
Dexedrine 10mg/24 pills
Dexedrine 5mg/24 pills
Three prescriptions for a total of 180 Quaalude tablets? In 24 days? 288 Dexedrine (of varying strengths)? Let that number sink in. Two-hundred and eighty-eight. And, of course, injectible Dilaudid and injectible Demerol.
How can anyone defend this? Why does anyone defend this?
Again, there was no tour in July 1977. There were no medical emergencies, no unusual medical incidents, no newly-diagnosed conditions that required this amount of pain medication, this amount of sedatives, nor this amount of stimulants. None of these medications was intended for Vernon or Minnie Mae. All were intended for Elvis, and all were written in his name.
Why?
ElvisDecoded 