- Tonight on Sunday, our mental health system's a mess. The families paying the ultimate, shocking price. - The last time I saw my mum, it was her body under a blanket behind police tape. - I kept on saying to the doctor, you know, there's something else. It'll fall on deaf ears. - Had there been a bed available, my dad may still be here today. - Is this acceptable in Aotearoa? - Services have become so disorganised, chaotic, under-resourced. - Was this preventable? - Yes. It was. - And, only fools rush in, so why couldn't Elvis help falling in love with underage girls? - How old were you when you met Elvis Presley? - 14. - I was just a baby. I was 14 years old. - There was a series of 14-year-olds, and up until... really, he was 40. - Yeah. No, it never stopped. - Kia ora, I'm Miriama Kamo. Disorganised, chaotic, under-resourced. That's mental health services for our highest risk patients, according to one of our top psychiatrists. Tonight, three unwell men, three families pleas for help, and the horrific acts of violence that followed. The victim's loved ones are devastated, asking how things went so far. They tell Mava Moayyed that each death was completely avoidable. Now a warning ` some details in Mava's story are disturbing. MAVA: Here in the Bay of Plenty, the sun's out. A perfect day for a picnic. - I'm starving. I'll have, yeah, a second course. Yeah. (SIGHS) But Amiria Karekare can't truly enjoy it. With family and friends here to support her, Amiria is preparing to tell us about the most painful day of her life. (TAKES DEEP BREATH) - All right. I will not let this go. Ever. I want what happened to her, and what continues to happen to other people to be acknowledged. If that means me reliving those moments on camera, so be it. Mm. It's important for my mum. Mm. - Between 5 and 7 people in Aotearoa are killed each year by someone suffering from a treatable psychotic disorder. Most people with these disorders are never violent. In fact, they're more likely to be the victims of violence. But a small group with key risk factors can suffer extreme delusions, causing them to do the unthinkable to innocent people, Like Amiria's mum, Kevin's son, and Cristina's dad. Multiple pleas for help, one broken system. three avoidable deaths. - People in New Zealand are increasingly missing out in adequate and appropriate psychiatric care. It's a tragedy. - This is Torere, Heart of New Zealand. (LAUGHS) And this is where I'm from. It was a place my mum loved. Like really loved, just like I do. She would come out here with my Aunty Moana and they would pick nuts in this orchard. I got this not long after I` we lost Mum. The fantail. Very significant with my mum. They used to follow her around in there. - Did Pania have plans for Torere? - She sure did. She was gonna build a house behind these trees. So I guess I'll do that now. My mum, Pania, was a wonderful mother. She raised me... on her own. She was a single mum. She was fiercely independent. She was a softie, (LAUGHS) and probably the most empathetic person I've ever known in my life. So many people loved her. - One of the people who loved Pania was Bobby Hill. - My mum was happy, she really was. She loved him a lot, and he... He made her happy. Yeah, and he loved her. - Tania often stayed with her partner Bobby at his home in Te Teko. Bobby's 24-year-old son, Tehiritanga Hill also lived there. - They spent a lot of time together, actually, and yeah, in the beginning, it seemed fine. - Amiria says in 2020, Tehiritanga started to become paranoid. - My mum rang me one night and said 'he's hearing voices'. - Tehiritanga later told psychiatrists he thought animals were staring at him, sensing the devil in him. He believed Satan was trying to control him. As his mental health deteriorated, he began lashing out at Pania. - She told me that he had actually threatened her. He'd held a knife to her throat. And the worst part of that is she looked me dead in the eye, and said 'he would never hurt me.' (CHUCKLES PAINFULLY) And I think she believed that. Yeah. - Concerned, his dad took him to see a GP on the 9th of June. - The doctor, um... assessed him, and decided that it probably was the onset of psychosis. He prescribed him risperidone and sent him home. This is a young man who's presenting for the first time, with undeniable symptoms of a very serious mental illness. And he was given antipsychotic medication, and sent home with two people who had no idea what to do. No idea. He wasn't assessed by a psychiatrist, and he should have been seen. In time. Yeah. - The GP sent a referral to the Whakatane crisis team. It was marked 'semi urgent,' triggering a response time of 72 hours. Over those three days, Tehiritanga only got worse. He said he watched Pania hang up the washing and thought she was a witch who'd made a pact with the devil. He believed she could read his thoughts and control his body. By the time the crisis team were due to respond, it was too late. - Because they received a report that he had been arrested in relation to my mother's homicide. - This is the house where Pania was staying with her partner Bob and his son Tehiritanga. On the morning of Friday, June 12th, 2020, Pania called Bob, who was out golfing, to tell him that Tehiritanga was becoming aggressive. A short while later, she called him back, but this time she was in tears. Tehiritanga grabbed the phone, and told his father 'she's the one to blame'. It's getting ugly. Bob rushed home, but it was too late. Tehiritanga struck Pania about eight times in the face and head with the hammer, leaving her to die on the lawn. - And the last time I saw my mum, it was her body under a blanket, lying on the front lawn of the house, behind police tape. And I wasn't allowed... to see her ever again. She wouldn't hurt a fly. And the way she died was so violent and so brutal that` Um... Yeah, it's just so unfair. - In a report following the incident, the Bay of Plenty District Health Board admitted they were understaffed, noting that when Tehiritanga's referral came in, there wasn't a full-time employee to triage referrals. Was this preventable? - Yes. It was. His care was not good enough. It wasn't good enough. He deserved the treatment that he needed, um, and because he didn't get it, my mum paid the ultimate price. - Schizophrenia affects about 20,000 people in New Zealand, with a higher prevalence among Maori. The disorder causes people to experience psychotic symptoms and interpret reality abnormally. - Psychotic symptoms are delusions, auditory or visual hallucinations. Thought disorder, where your ability to think logically is impaired. - Dr Eric Monasterio is one of the country's top forensic psychiatrists. - The defendant does not have an insanity defence. - It's his job to assess people like triple-murderer Lauren Dickason for serious mental disorders after high-level offending. - There is no definitive physical test or blood test that will confirm the diagnosis. As a consequence of that, there is quite a lot of disagreement, even amongst experts, as to when a person fulfils the diagnostic criteria for something like schizophrenia. - In 2019, after an inquiry into the state of our mental health services, the government committed an unprecedented $1.9 billion to improving the sector. - Increasingly in New Zealand, we've been not able to fund or provide services to treat the 3% of the population who are affected by serious mental illness. The Mental Health and Addictions Inquiry pointed out that we should be providing care to up to 20% of the population. - Four years on, he believes things are worse. - What the inquiry has done, is it's diluted the resources, the focus has shifted away from those with serious mental disorders. So as a consequence, those at the more severe end of the spectrum are doing even less well. - Chase! (CHASE WOOFS) - Here. - This is Christina Blithe, and the running furball, that's Chase. - He'd ring me up and he'd say, how's my grandson Chase? So, he wouldn't say 'Hello. How are you? What are you doing?' It was about the dog. It wasn't about me. I miss that so much. Dad used to treat that dog as if he was an actual person. - Colin Blithe. He's a dad, a brother... - It's a lovely photo. - I remember that. ...and an uncle. - I think one of my first memories is when my dad would say 'in the weekend, we're going to visit Uncle Colin.' We'd excitedly get in the car because he was a fun uncle, but hard working, too. - I don't remember the playhouse that he built. - Don't you? - He was a wonderful builder. Whatever he could build, he would build it for me, yeah. He just wanted to help. - The 68-year-old was living in Napier in a shared apartment in the heart of the city. - I think he just kind of fell into the role of property manager, because he also used to be like the maintenance man, and he used to call it his castle. It's far from a castle, but it was his castle, and he loved it there. - One of Colin's flatmates was 34-year-old Timothy Buchanan. - I do remember him saying to me that he had people living there that he was not very happy with, that he was gonna talk to about moving out. But I had no idea that someone like this was living there. - Did he mention or write about Timothy at all in this diary? - Um, he did. - This is Colin's diary. - On the 8th of January, he underlined Tim, and just said 'two weeks notice? Question mark. Question mark. 'See what happens.' On the day of Dad's death, there was an entry, obviously not from dad, just saying that he had passed away. I can only assume it was the offender that wrote that. - Coming up ` assessed but not helped. - Had there been a bed available, my dad may still be here today. - And a father afraid for his son. - He stabbed his eye right out. - Colin Blithe with his sailor's hat was a familiar sight around Napier. I used to say, 'Please, can you take that hat off? We're going out for lunch. Please just take the hat off.' And if I could go back now, I would... I would have let him wear that hat to my wedding. - On a summer's afternoon earlier this year, Christina was told her dad, Colin, was dead. - And we just walked in the door, pretty much. And, like, a police officer turned up, my husband came and got me, and he said, 'It's your dad.' He couldn't confirm what had actually happened. He just said it was unexplained. But the next day, I had googled 'Napier man dead,' and the article said police are launching a homicide investigation. I knew it was about Dad. I instantly thought it must have been an accident. No one would actually want to hurt my dad. - Timothy Buchanan had recently moved in to Colin's apartment. He'd been diagnosed with schizophrenia when he was 20. Now 34, he'd stopped taking his medication and had become aggressive. - I know that Uncle Colin and Timothy's mum, Paula, had been working together to try and get Timothy help. - Dad had been trying to help this person. Yeah. (SOBS) WHISPERS: Sorry. Thank you. And of course, he was trying to help somebody. - When flatmates became concerned about Timothy's behaviour, Colin served him with a two week eviction notice, and contacted the Hawke's Bay mental health team. On the 13th of January this year, a doctor came and assessed Timothy, saying he was more psychotic than baseline and would benefit from inpatient care. Unfortunately, though, there were no beds available. - That's not a good enough excuse. There needs to be something else. Because one day later, my dad was dead. - Timothy believed Colin was an alien from another planet. Turned away from the mental health unit, the very next day, he choked Colin to death. - It was just such a shame that there wasn't a place for him to go to. - The group of patients who are likely to present the greatest risk of potential harm to themselves and others is increasingly being left behind by services. - Forensic psychiatrist Erik Monasterio. - It is very sad for me, who worked in the public health system for 27 years, to observe this decay in the availability of services. - For Erik, it reached a tipping point. He chose to leave his clinical lead position and the entire public health sector. - My ability to lead an effective service was compromised, and when I felt I could have no impact, was necessary for me to step aside. - Just a few weeks out from summer, and it's been snowing here in Invercargill. - We'll come up to Oroti Street. - How does it feel for you being here? - I don't like it. They said that he had a blank look on his face, and was polite. - He just had no idea what was going on. - No. - He actually made the 111 call himself, didn't he? - Yeah. Yeah, yeah. - Kevin Boyle is dad to three sons. This is his middle child, Joe Boyle. - He's always been polite, and he helped people. Hunting mad. Used to go with his granddad all the time, um, fishing. He was a great kid. - When Joe was in his early teens, Kevin met the love of his life, Tania. - I fancied her, so, yeah. She was cool. Big heart, good personality, good person. - Tania had two young sons of her own, James and Josh. When Tania and Kevin married 14 years ago, they suddenly had a basketball team of boys, all of their names starting with J. When did you start noticing changes in Joe? - When he went over that cliff. - In 2018, after a hunting trip, Joe's car careered off a steep drop, leaving him with a brain injury. - He became a recluse. He didn't talk as much. Joe was never 100% after that, and it got worse and worse and worse. - Joe reported to a psychiatrist that he was hearing voices in 2011. - It's like he had moments. - Moments of psychosis? - Yeah. He parked up at McDonald's and he was just sitting in the truck, and he had all the guns, and the dogs. - In the notes that we read, he thought that the Yakuza had put silicone flies into his food and was spying on him. - Yeah. - What did the psychiatrist say was wrong with him? - He was bipolar. But I kept on saying to the doctor, you know, there's something else. - Joe was prescribed lithium, a mood stabiliser. But for years, he struggled with voices and delusions and had multiple run-ins with the law. In 2016, Joe tried to catch fish from this driveway. - He's got the motorcycle helmet on and he's fishing. - In a court report, a psychiatrist found that Joe was insane at the time, but still, no one properly recognised his schizophrenia. How much confidence did you have in the treatment that Joe was getting? - None. And they knew. - By 2019, Joe was seriously unwell. He saw worms coming out of his dishes. Kevin says he asked for help dozens of times. - Ring, ring, ring, ring, talk, talk, talk. I told them that I was worried for Joe's safety and other's safety. - How much weight should we give to observations from family members close to that person? - Oh, it's key, because family members, friends that know the person well, they're in a better position to determine whether there has been a change in them and whether that change then may be explicable by a mental disorder. - Despite his history and pleas for help from his family, the Southern District Mental Health team failed to make contact with Joe. They reported that they tried to visit him, but for various reasons, including the caseworker being scared of Joe's dogs and it being a long weekend, they didn't see him. On the morning of December 8th, Joe's psychosis was overwhelming him. He saw a toy train come out of his television. Then a rabbit. Terrified, he smashed the TV. Later that evening... Deep in psychosis, Joe believed his stepbrother James was the devil. He killed him. James was 19, Tania's younger son. Did you consider James a son? - Yep. (SNIFFS) (CHOKES) He wanted to get a job, get a lot of money and get a fast car. And he was sort of trying, but he never got a chance. Yeah. - Joe was charged with James's murder. While in prison, there were several serious self-harm incidents, but psychiatrists still didn't change his bipolar diagnosis. - He stabbed his eye right out. How sick do you gotta be to do that? - Several months later, after being assessed at Auckland's Mason Clinic, his diagnosis was finally changed to schizophrenia and he was put on antipsychotic medication. - How come down here, they could see it and keep on misdiagnosing him? Where he goes to the Mason Clinic, he's there ten minutes, they know exactly what the go is. - Do you believe that James's death could have been prevented? - Yeah, definitely. - How? - If they'd done their job. - Coming up ` - Hello. Can I speak to Joe Boyle, please? - Hello, Joe Boyle speaking. - Just when you think... it can't be any worse, in the eyes of the law, he's not guilty. - Nau mai ano. The devastating failures in our mental health system have torn three families apart. Struggling in the wake of what they say were avoidable violent acts, they're left wondering how the warning signs were missed. Their losses are unbearable, and the consequences roll on. - Hey, Mum. (POIGNANT PIANO MUSIC) - There's not a single moment on any day that my mum is not in my head and my heart. This ring, she had taken it off, left it in the glove box of her car, which was at the crime scene. But, um... It helps. It's been on her finger. - Amiria Karekare's mother, Pania Melrose, was killed by her partner's son in 2020. He pleaded not guilty to murder. - The level of scrutiny on any person being considered for an insanity defence is extremely high. - Forensic psychiatrist Erik Monasterio. - That illness has to be active at the time of the alleged offences, and the impact of that disorder is such that the accused fails to understand differences between right and wrong. - How easy is it to fake being insane in order to get an insanity plea in court? - In my experience, it's an extremely difficult thing to do. You're subject to comprehensive assessment, generally in a hospital setting, where you're supervised 24 hours a day. - Tehiritanga Hill was found not guilty of murder by reason of insanity. - That was a kick in the guts. Knowing that... there will never be any justice. It's over. And he's not guilty. And that's crushing. I can never forgive him. And I know that... it wasn't him. But... He killed my mum. - Amiria read a victim impact statement in court. She believes it got through to Tehiritanga. - When my aunty and I turned around to go back to our seats, he was crying. So I think he heard us. - Over in Napier, Timothy was acquitted of the murder of Cristina's dad, Colin Blithe, due to insanity. - Probably the hardest thing I've ever had to hear in my life, because there's no other way to describe what he's done. It wasn't an accident. - Colin's niece, Heidi, believes everyone was badly let down. - And I do want to acknowledge that his mum, in court, she was by herself. It was hard for` It was hard for us. We... we had all our family with us. She was sitting there by herself. She had no victim support. She had no family with her. So my dad and my stepmum, Marie, they chose to sit with her. - Hello. Can I speak to Joe Boyle, please? - Hello, Joe Boyle speaking. - Gidday, Joe Boyle. - Hey, how are you going, Dad? - Average. You? - Average, yeah, not too bad. - Kevin Boyle's son, Joe, was also found not guilty of James's murder by reason of insanity. - What'd you have for dinner? - I had a lasagne. I've started drawing a picture. - Cool. What's the picture of? - (INDISTINCT) - I don't want any, dear. - He's currently being held in a secure psychiatric unit in Dunedin. - OK. Love you, Dad. - Love you too, mate. OK. - Thank you very much. - The aim of all psychiatric care is to rehabilitate and reintegrate the person back into society. In my experience, 90 to 95% of people who are found insane will eventually return to the community at a time when their illnesses are well enough controlled such that the risk to themselves or others is substantially diminished. - Remember, most sufferers of psychotic disorders are never violent. For the ones who are a risk, Dr Erik Monasterio stresses they're treatable. These deaths are avoidable. - Services have become so disorganised, chaotic, under-resourced. My concern is that if the chaos continues, we will see more and more adverse incidents occurring. - I know that he could be a good member of the community, and I` and I know that he, you know, he'd do anything to have a crack at it again. And James'd be here. This is the ashes of James Aaron Clark. And my wife, Tania. They keep an eye on me (CHUCKLES) - Do they? - Yeah. - You got them next to your bed? - Yep. And I've slept good since Tania's been here, yeah. - Two months ago, Tania died by suspected suicide. - When she died, she had the photo... ...arranged. Yeah. - The photo of her sons? - Both of them, yeah. - Despite what had happened, Tania loved Joe, and left behind a special note for him. What did that note say? - That she was proud of him. I wish she was here. I wish James was here. I wish Joe was here. What's a wish get you? - Kevin, you've been through unimaginable pain. How do you tolerate it? - Every day above the ground is a good one. - Well, we approached Te Whatu Ora for comment on all three cases, asking them if any changes have been made after the deaths of Pania, Colin and James. In a statement, Te Whatu Ora agrees it's still too difficult for some people to get the specialist help that they need, and say mental health reforms are underway. Resources, meanwhile, remain strained. The southern district where Kevin lives is 20% down on staffing numbers right now. E haere ake nei, troubling new revelations about the King of Rock and roll... - His sort of, sweet spot, I guess, would have been a 14-year-old girl. - He was my very first love, my very first kiss, everything. ...And his underage lovers. - He was Elvis, you know, everybody wanted Elvis. - Hoki mai ano. Did Elvis Presley have an obsession with underage girls? We know wife Priscilla was just 14 when Elvis, 24, fell in love with her. What we didn't know was how many of his other girlfriends were also 14. Tonight, his former teen lovers speak to Amelia Adams. (BLUESY MUSIC) AMELIA: It was 1956, and the world had never seen anything like this. - I was on the second row. I was up front. He was just wild. We were crazy little teenyboppers. - Hysterical young women whipped into a frenzy by Elvis Presley's wild hip thrusting and sultry voice. (BLUESY MUSIC) - I remember how amazing he looked. I was just totally in awe, just screaming and hollering and carrying on. I wasn't pulling my hair out or anything like some were. - Within months of this concert, Frances Forbes would become a secretive member of a teen pack of girls dating Elvis Presley. While we've always known that Elvis fell in love with 14-year-old Priscilla Beaulieu, what has been hidden until now was his infatuation with young girls. How old were you when you met Elvis Presley? - 14. - Oh my goodness. (LAUGHS) I was just a baby. I was 14 years old. - You were a child? - Yes, I guess so. I practically grew up in Graceland. # Won't you wear my ring? Around your neck? # - My mother used to call out here, early in the morning and start yelling at me not being home in time for school. - Frances lives just half an hour from Elvis's Memphis home. But since his death, she stayed away from the place that holds so many special memories. - It hasn't changed. It looks exactly the same. - Today, she's decided to bring her granddaughter to Graceland to finally tell her story. - I was out here just about every night that he was home. - Yeah? - It was here at these gates where Elvis spotted 14-year-old Frances in the crowd and invited her inside. What was your very first impression of him when you met him up close? - That he was better looking than I thought he was. He would call me Little Frances. - It wasn't long before 22-year-old Elvis was asking little Frances here to Graceland on a regular basis. Were you in love with him? - Very much. He was my very first love, my very first kiss, everything. - Was it a physical relationship? - So-so. It wasn't a sexual relationship, not really. It was more like, you know, teenagers. They... They neck, they kiss, and carry on. But that's as far as it goes. At least that's what it used to be. - In those early years, Frances knew she was one of many, in competition with the local girls and a revolving door of Hollywood starlets. - No, you didn't like the sharing, but you did. You understood. He was Elvis, you know, everybody wanted Elvis. # Love me tender, love me sweet. # - Elvis' behaviour is hard to believe, even for author Suzanne Finstad. Suzanne wrote the first Priscilla biography 20 years ago, but was recently shocked to discover the King's numerous teenage love affairs. - And I didn't know that Priscilla was not the only 14-year-old girl, that he had a proclivity for teenage girls, and that she was one in a long line. - There was a series of 14-year-olds, and up until, really, he was 40. - Yeah, no, it never stopped. And Elvis is someone who, because he became famous so young, he... I think suffered from kind of an arrested emotional development. He, you know, was suddenly a big rock and roll star, and he was still kind of frozen at a more elementary level. - When Elvis was away from his Memphis girls shooting movies in Hollywood, his appetite for young teenagers never eased. In 1960, when he was 25, he spotted Sandy Ferra in a photograph at her father's nightclub and asked to meet her, despite Sandy being only 14. Her parents eventually agreed. - He was absolutely gorgeous, and then he called and said he wanted to date me. And my mother said, 'I don't care if you're King Farouk. My daughter's only 14. She doesn't date.' And he said, 'oh, well, Mrs Ferra, you can come on the dates.' - How did that work? What was that like? I thought, oh, well, this is kind of embarrassing, but it was the only way I could go. So it was at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel. He would order pizzas, banana splits, we'd sit and watch television, we'd dance. And it was fun. I mean, I had a really good time, and then my mom would take me home. - But on the fourth date, Sandy's parents allowed her to go alone. The beginning of a whirlwind romance that today would be considered completely unsuitable. - It was a lot of hugging and kissing. He would shave very closely for me, but my skin, still, cos he still was a man's face with little whiskers. I'd go to school the next day, and my face would be all red and kind of raw. (FUNKY MUSIC) - Their relationship intensified, with Sandy working on some of Elvis' hit films as an extra. Incredibly, the superstar even asked the teenager to move from Los Angeles to Memphis to live with him at Graceland, not long before Priscilla moved in. - And my mother said, over her dead body. So that was the end of that. - Could have been you, in a way. Do you ever think that? That was the plan? - Yeah. The thought, of course, it would be` it would be impossible for that thought not to be there. - During many hours interviewing Priscilla Presley, Suzanne Finstad gleaned a deeply personal and revealing insight into Elvis' behaviour, which she now thinks might explain the rock stars desire for baby-faced teens. - You know, Priscilla told me a really interesting thing when I was working on the biography of Priscilla. She said that Elvis confided in her more than once that he felt this tremendous pressure to perform sexually. Because he was Elvis, he was the king, he was the sex symbol, and he felt more comfortable and more, I guess, in control and more sexually authoritative if he was with an inexperienced girl because they didn't know any different. His sort of sweet spot, I guess, with women or girls would have been a 14-year-old girl. - Well, as you'll see, Elvis Presley's tastes never changed, even as he approached 40. - I mean, if a 39-year-old man now was making out with a 14-year-old, he'd be in jail. - Yeah, I know, I know. - You're a little old for the teenagers now. - I don't know, I don't feel too old. I still move around pretty good. - This was something that was against the law. # You look like an angel. Look like an angel... # Rysa Gosen still gets chills when she tries on this floor-length blue denim rhinestone coat. It was the height of fashion back in the 1970s, when Rysa was treated to a once in a lifetime shopping trip with the King of Rock and roll. The beginning of an intense six month relationship. How old were you when you met Elvis? - Oh my goodness. I was just a baby. I was 14 years old. - It was 1974, and Rysa was hanging out with Elvis Presley's younger stepbrothers when Elvis showed up. - This white Cadillac pulls up a little later and we get in the car. He turned around, smiled at me, and said, I've heard all about you. He just, he seemed like such a gentleman, that he just was so curious to know about me right away, right off the bat. - The infatuation was instant and mutual, Elvis sweeping Rysa off her feet during the high end shopping trip. A dream come true for a 14-year-old girl. - They closed down the whole store, and I had never been into a store like that in my life. And behind me walked Elvis. And he said, 'that coat looks like it's just for you.' So before I knew it, we were walking out with over $2,700 worth of clothes he bought me. - That same day, Elvis invited Rysa back to Graceland, the first of many visits to his Memphis home, where they spent more and more time alone. - You know, I said, why? I'm curious to know why you're even interested in a girl my age. You know, being so young. And he just mentioned to me that it took him back to his younger years, made him feel alive to where he just didn't, like... I wasn't expecting much from him, and so it just made him feel more comfortable. - Do you think back now, though, and think, my goodness, I mean, if a 39-year-old man now was making out with a 14-year-old, he'd be in jail. - Yeah, I know, I know. - We kissed for hours. (LAUGHS) And it was wonderful. - Sandy Ferra, now Martindale, who also dated Elvis when she was just 14, insists there was nothing inappropriate going on. - He wasn't a grown man at 24. He really wasn't. He was a kid. He was a kid, and he wanted to be with people that he felt he wasn't inferior to. - There are people who call it paedophilia. What's your response to that? - There was no such thing as paedophilia in those days anyway. I never even heard a word like that. I mean, it just wasn't happening. - It's that common denial of anything untoward that's striking among these women. Frances Forbes was also 14 when she dated a 22-year-old Elvis Presley. - My mother was 14 when she married my daddy, who was 22, so I didn't think too much about it, tell you the truth. - That's the first time I'm going to answer that one. I don't know, I don't feel too old. I still move around pretty good. - As someone who knows more about Elvis than most biographers, Suzanne Finstad remains uncomfortable with the reality of his love life. Was Elvis Presley a paedophile? - You know, I think part of it was there were psychological elements at play with Elvis. Not that that excuses the age of the girls that he was dating. And I think part of it is that he grew up in the Deep South, in America. And at a time when, you know, it was somewhat commonplace in rural areas for young men to date young girls. From the accounts of these girls, now women, Elvis was very aware that there was a line. - Yeah, he would tell them quite regularly, 14 will get you 20, meaning he would be in prison for 20 years. So he did know that this was something that was against the law. - Elvis's teenage girlfriends clearly still adore him and reflect fondly on their liaisons, but they concede by today's standards, the relationships would be unthinkable. Would you let your 14-year-old date a 39-year-old? - No. Because I was thinking, I was thinking, Thank God I didn't have a daughter because I can't imagine, you know. - Do you look back with the benefit of hindsight and think, my goodness, I wouldn't let my daughter or granddaughter spend the night at a 20-year-old man's house. - Yeah, I probably wouldn't. Wouldn't like that. But then again, they wouldn't be Elvis. # Time goes by. # - For the women he loved, his timeless voice still brings back cherished memories of an extraordinary but unusual bond with a man whose life ended far too soon. (VOCALISES) - I felt so complete in his arms. Here I go again. If I died at that moment, it would have been fine. # Honey. # - But you know what? He was only on this planet for 42 years. And when you think of his body of work, of recordings, of movies, he didn't have too much time to be screwing around with girls. He was` He worked most of his life. So whatever enjoyment he got other than that, God bless him for it, you know? - Yeah, nah. Like the women in the story, Elvis's wife Priscilla also maintains that he never took advantage of her, despite being just 14 when they met. And that is our show for tonight. Do share your feedback on social media, and if you have a story for us, our email is sunday@tvnz.co.nz And of course you can find our stories and full shows on the Sunday page at TVNZ+.