Popular Elvis impersonator caught in motel with naked 16-year-old runaway, PA cops say

An Elvis Presley impersonator who has toured for about three decades faces child sex charges after authorities say he was caught with a teenage runaway, according to federal officials and news reports.

Matthew Chantelois, who reportedly goes by the name Matt King while performing as Elvis, was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges “relating to the sexual exploitation of children,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Pennsylvania said in a Feb. 23 news release.

Chantelois, 45, of Dearborn Heights, Michigan, was initially arrested in January when he was caught in a Summit Township, Pennsylvania, motel room with a naked 16-year-old girl who had run away from her New York home, GoErie.com reported, citing state police.

The girl was known to be with Chantelois, and they were located when New York State Police investigators pinged his phone to the motel, Erie News Now reported.

She told authorities she had sex with Chantelois and he gave her vodka, according to GoErie.com.

At the time, he faced local charges of interfering with the custody of a child, corruption of minors and furnishing alcohol to a minor, court records show.

Now, Chantelois is charged federally with sexual exploitation of a minor, transportation of material depicting the sexual exploitation of a minor, and possession of material depicting the sexual exploitation of a minor.

Federal officials say that from October 2023 to January 2024, Chantelois persuaded and coerced the child “to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing visual depictions of such conduct.”

An attorney for Chantelois could not be immediately reached.

Chantelois faces between 15 and 60 years in prison if he is found guilty, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said in a news release.

Under his Matt King name, Chantelois has made national TV appearances and has won dozens of contests dating back to 1997, according to his website. In addition to his Elvis impersonations, he has also transformed into “Roy Orbison, Joe Cocker, Waylon Jennings, Paul McCartney (and) Dean Martin.”

“I met a lot of good friends and my wife, traveled the world. All from Elvis,” he told the Detroit Free Press in a 2017 interview.