Lisa Marie Presley's official cause of death has been deferred

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By Phoebe Egoroff

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One week after the tragic death of Lisa Marie Presley, her official cause of death has remained undetermined.

The 54-year-old reportedly suffered a cardiac arrest at her home in Calabasas, California, on January 12. She was subsequently rushed to hospital, where she passed away several hours later.

A mom-of-four, Lisa Marie leaves behind three daughters - 33-year-old Riley Keough and 14-year-old twins Harper and Finley. Her son Benjamin died by suicide in 2020 at the age of 27, which consumed her with grief, something that she wrote about in an essay for grief awareness several months ago.

The only child of Elvis and Priscilla Presley will be laid to rest at Graceland - Elvis' estate in Memphis, Tennessee - alongside her father, her son, her paternal grandparents, and her paternal great-grandmother, as previously reported.

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Lisa Marie and her son Benjamin pictured in 2015. Credit: MediaPunch Inc / Alamy

Now, the Los Angeles coroner has apparently "deferred" Lisa Marie's cause of death. Sarah Ardalani, a spokesperson with the Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner, told CNN on Tuesday (January 17) that the late singer had been examined on January 14 and that her cause of death had been deferred.

"Deferred means that after an autopsy, a cause of death has not been determined and the medical examiner is requesting more investigation into the death, including additional studies," Ardalani stated, via PEOPLE. "Once the tests/studies come back, the doctor evaluates the case again and makes the cause of death determination."

Lisa Marie has a family history of cardiac problems - her father Elvis passed away on August 16, 1977, at the age of 42 after suffering from what The Washington Post stated at the time was cardiac arrhythmia with ventricular fibrillation. This occurs when the heart beats abnormally then stops.

When he passed, Lisa Marie was just nine years old. She wrote about how her father's death deeply affected her as she grew up, penning an emotional essay in PEOPLE magazine two years following the death of her son in honor of National Grief Awareness Day.

"Grief is something you will have to carry with you for the rest of your life, in spite of what certain people or our culture wants us to believe. You do not 'get over it,' you do not 'move on,' period," she wrote. "I've dealt with death, grief and loss since the age of nine years old. I've had more than anyone's fair share of it in my lifetime and somehow, I've made it this far.

"But this one, the death of my beautiful, beautiful son? The sweetest and most incredible being that I have ever had the privilege of knowing, who made me feel so honored every single day to be his mother? Who was so much like his grandfather on so many levels that he actually scared me? Which made me worry about him even more than I naturally would have? No," she added.

Just days prior to her death, Lisa Marie had visited Graceland to remember Elvis on what would have been his 88th birthday on January 8. Then, two days after that she attended the Golden Globes with her mother Priscilla to support the cast of Baz Luhrmann's Elvis biopic, for which Austin Butler won a Best Actor award.

Rolling Stone has reported that a public memorial service for Lisa Marie will be held at Graceland this Sunday (January 22) at 09:00 AM.

Featured image credit: ZUMA Press, Inc. / Alamy