The world felt a huge loss when B.B. King died at the age of 89 on May 15. He lived in Las Vegas and kept up a rigorous touring schedule until last year. King’s death came a few weeks after one of his daughters, Patty, spoke with TMZ about how she suspected elder abuse on behalf of her father’s manager, LaVerne Toney. The two had argued about whether King needed to be hospitalized after what turned out to be a minor heart attack. Toney had power of attorney over King, so Patty called the police in order to summon paramedics. Patty provided TMZ with a haunting photo that showed King in the hospital.

Patty hoped the photo would persuade authorities to help protect her father. She previously alleged that Toney (and his assistant) withheld B.B.’s medication and stole between $20-30 million from her father over the years. Sadly, B.B. King only lived a few more weeks. Patty and another one of King’s daughters, Karen, believe that Toney and his assistant poisoned King to death. Some excerpts from Hollywood Reporter:

Daughters Karen Williams and Patty King allege that family members were prevented from visiting while King’s business manager, LaVerne Toney, and his personal assistant, Myron Johnson, hastened their father’s death.

Toney is named in King’s will as executor of an estate that, according to court documents filed by lawyers for some of King’s heirs, could total tens of millions of dollars.

Johnson was at B.B. King’s bedside when he died May 14 in hospice care at home in Las Vegas at age 89. No family members were present.

“I believe my father was poisoned and that he was administered foreign substances,” Patty King and Williams say in identically worded sections of affidavits provided to The Associated Press by their lawyer, Larissa Drohobyczer. “I believe my father was murdered,” they say.

A week before King’s death, a judge in Las Vegas dismissed a request from Williams to take over as King’s guardian. An April 29 petition alleged that Toney had blocked King’s friends from visiting him and had put her family members on King’s payroll. It also alleged that large sums of money had disappeared from King’s bank accounts.

But Clark County Family Court Hearing Master Jon Norheim said on May 7 that police and social services investigations in October and April uncovered no reason to take power-of-attorney from Toney.

Williams, Patty King and another daughter — Rita Washington — vowed to keep fighting. “We lost the battle, but we haven’t lost the war,” Williams said then.

Drohobyczer said she represents Williams, Patty King and most of King’s nine other adult children and heirs. “The family is sticking together … to oust Ms. Toney based on her illegal conduct, conflicts of interest and self-dealing,” she said. She alleged that Toney hastened King’s death by “misconduct, or by failing to properly attend to his medical needs.”

An affidavit from Patty King, who used to live at King’s home, says she saw Johnson administer to King two drops of an unknown substance on his tongue during evenings for several months before his death, and that Toney never told her what the substance was.

[From Hollywood Reporter]

Conflicting reports have come out. A lawyer for King’s estate told the AP there is no active investigation in to King’s death. Attorney Brent Bryson says three different doctors concluded that King received proper care “up until the time he peacefully died in his sleep.” But Yahoo quotes a Nevada coroner’s office, which says Las Vegas police have officially launched a homicide investigation.

This story sounds so harrowing and scary. The day after King died, the coroner initially reported that the cause of death was a series of mini-strokes (related to type 2 diabetes). This past Sunday, an autopsy was performed on King’s body to determine his true cause of death. Results may take up to two months.

Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet