The judge (left) presiding over the Anna Nicole Smith burial hearing ruled Thursday that Smith's remains should be given to the guardian ad litem representing her infant daughter, Dannielynn. But the judge said he wants Smith buried with her late son Daniel in the Bahamas. "I have suffered for this, I have struggled with this, I have shed tears for your little girl," Broward County Circuit Court Judge (The Nut) Larry Seidlin said to Smith's mother about 15 minutes before he ruled. He said Smith wanted to be buried next to her son Daniel, and that the flame of her beauty was quickly going out. He also urged all the possible fathers of Smith's newborn daughter to get a paternity test. A series of final witnesses were called on Thursday, including the former Playboy Playmate's first husband Billy Smith, the father of Smith's son Daniel, who testified by telephone. Billy Smith, whom Smith married when she was 17, said he wished his son Daniel were buried in Texas, but he didn't have the money to exhume him. Billy Smith added that he wanted Daniel buried next to his mother. Smith's ex-boyfriend Larry Birkhead took the witness stand for the second straight day Thursday in the Florida hearing about who should get custody of Smith's body, testifying more about how he pleaded with Smith to stop her excessive use of prescription medication while she was pregnant.
The hearing recessed Thursday after one attorney almost fainted because of a diabetic reaction to low blood sugar. Birkhead testified that Smith — who was 39 when she died Feb. 8 of as-yet unknown causes — came close to death many times. Birkhead also told the court that Smith's most recent companion, Howard K. Stern, repeatedly interfered in their relationship when the couple's problems mounted in May 2006, ignored Birkhead's concerns about Smith's drug use and harassed Birkhead to deny that he was the father of the baby Smith was carrying. Stern and Birkhead have both claimed paternity of the child, Dannielynn, who is now 5 months old. That matter will be handled by a separate court in California, at least for now. "At times, I took her medicine," Birkhead testified. "I was told by Mr. Stern to give it back to her because she needed it to live. In addition to that, I told her over and over, 'Don't. Something's going to happen to you. Something's going to happen.'" Birkhead's voice broke, and he put his head in his hands. Birkhead, a photographer, also said that after he and Smith went their separate ways, Stern called him repeatedly during jobs he was on to tell him to deny that he was the baby's father, and posted nasty things about him on Smith's Web site. Until then, Birkhead testified he often said "No comment" when asked whether he was the father. "I finally agreed [to deny paternity] just to get him off my back," Birkhead testified. "Then he was saying Anna Nicole wanted me out of her life and said I just wanted my 15 minutes of fame." Birkhead also admitted that he did sell photographs showing Smith and him together to prove they'd been romantically involved. "I told Howard and Anna it wasn't fair for him to be saying that. She said, 'You're not the star. I'm the star,'" said Birkhead. "So I released photos to establish the relationship, and as a result of those photos, I have been compensated and will be compensated."
He said he didn't know off hand how much he was being paid for the pictures, but he said he could get that information to the court. One of Stern's lawyers also showed Birkhead a series of e-mails he allegedly wrote to Smith after their relationship was ending in which he sounded angry and said things like Smith was heading to "the fire pits of Hell." He confirmed that he'd written most of them, but said he didn't remember writing the note that mentioned hell. He confirmed that he'd written most of them, but said he didn't remember writing the note that mentioned hell. For a week, attorneys battling for the remains of have fought with one another, fought off the media and fought for a chance to speak. Now their biggest fight is against the clock. Seidlin had originally set a self-imposed Friday morning deadline to issue a decision in the case, which boiled down to a tug-of-war between Smith's estranged mother, Virgie Arthur, who wanted to bring her daughter's body home to Texas, and her attorney-turned-boyfriend Stern who wanted a burial in the Bahamas. Seidlin said he had no time to waste, since the county's chief medical examiner warned again that a decision needed to be made soon before Smith's body became too decomposed for a public viewing. "I got a gun to my head," Seidlin said Wednesday.
Seidlin indicated at the start of testimony Wednesday that he wanted to reach a compromise agreement, but it was unclear what that might be. A recess was called for lunch Thursday after one of Arthur's attorneys, John O'Quinn, apparently had a brief diabetic episode because of low blood sugar, and participants ran over him in alarm. He was given something to drink and Seidlin called for a lunch break. Asked whether he'd object to releasing Smith's body to her mother, Birkhead said on the stand that he wouldn't. After Birkhead stepped down from the stand, Houston police officer Troy Hollier, a former bodyguard of Smith's, testified as a witness for Stern's case. He said Smith had expressed negative feelings about her home state of Texas. The last time he saw Smith, said Hollier, was right after her 20-year-old son Daniel's funeral in the Bahamas. He said he was talking to her by the swimming pool at her Bahamas residence. "She said, 'Troy, if anything should happen to me, I want to be with Daniel,'" Hollier testified.
He also said he'd never seen Smith use prescription medication or any other drugs and he didn't see her taking pills in the period around Daniel's funeral. Daniel died in September of a lethal drug combination. The judge got angry at Hollier's claims that though he knew Smith well, he'd never seen her use drugs — since everyone else had testified that she had been on medication — and asked that he step down from the witness stand. "Something doesn't add up here," Seidlin said. "I'm not buying it." On Wednesday, Arthur testified that her last conversation with her daughter about her burial came more than 10 years ago, when Smith said she wanted to be interred near her idol Marilyn Monroe, whose body is in a Los Angeles crypt. The admission could hurt the woman's fight to have the former pinup laid to rest in her native Texas. "Wherever the stars are buried, that's where she wanted to be buried," Arthur said. Birkhead testified he had had a similar conversation with his ex-girlfriend in recent years. Even Stern has acknowledged the former Playboy model had hoped to be buried near Monroe, though he said she settled on a Bahamian site after her son died last year and the details of the California plot could not be worked out. O'Quinn said after the hearing Wednesday that he'd simply be happy if Smith wasn't buried in the Bahamas. Asked about California he said: "Better than the Bahamas." Wednesday's hearing stretched past the official close of the courthouse and had no shortage of drama. The testimony was peppered with details of Smith's drug use, her sexual liaisons and alleged deals being pursued to profit from the deaths of the starlet and her son. On the stand, Arthur was hammered with questions about any compensation she has or would receive from news organizations for access to interviews or footage after the deaths of her daughter and grandson. She frequently said no to questions about arrangements with specific media outlets, and sidestepped other questions or claimed she didn't understand them. "Have you in any fashion profited at all from the death of your daughter?" asked Krista Barth, an attorney for Stern. Arthur stared for a moment. "I'm trying to process that question," she said. Then Arthur attempted to deflect the attention, pointing at Stern. "He has," she said. The Florida hearing was just a morsel of the legal battle surrounding Smith. At issue in a California court is who fathered Dannielynn, who could inherit millions of dollars from Smith's estate. Smith married Texas oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall II in 1994 when he was 89 and she was 26 and she had been fighting his family over his estimated $500 million fortune since his death in 1995.
Anna Nicole Smith and Ruthless Howard K. Stern
Howard K. Stern, Anna Nicole Smith's attorney and partner, filed a defamation lawsuit Friday against the lawyer for Smith's mother. The suit, filed in federal court in West Palm Beach, Florida, alleges John O'Quinn, attorney for Virgie Arthur, defamed Stern in statements made on television after the actress' death in February. "The lawsuit focuses on Mr. O'Quinn's recent appearances on a number of national television shows in which he has made public accusations of murder and other misconduct against Mr. Stern in connection with the Anna Nicole Smith case," according to a statement released by Stern attorney L. Lin Wood of Atlanta, Georgia. Wood specifically cited a February 21, 2007, interview from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, for the Fox News show "On the Record with Greta Van Susteren." "As stated in the complaint filed today, Mr. O'Quinn's accusations against Mr. Stern are false and Mr. Stern seeks to hold him accountable through the civil justice system." O'Quinn could not be reached for comment Friday. In the Bahamas on Friday, attorneys in the custody case surrounding Smith's 7-month-old daughter said the judge wants Larry Birkhead -- declared Tuesday to be the child's father -- and Arthur to come up with a plan regarding access to the child. The two were supposed to meet Thursday but did not. The judge told the parties to get together and appear in court next Friday. O'Quinn told CNN's "Larry King Live" earlier this week that Arthur would not seek any sort of guardianship for baby Dannielynn after Birkhead's paternity was revealed. After the custody hearing, Stern said Birkhead has been visiting Dannielynn at Stern's home, where she has been staying since Smith's death. "At least informally, the transition period has already begun," Stern said. "Larry spent the majority of the last days over at the house getting to know Dannielynn. He's been changing diapers, he's been feeding her, he's been playing with her, and if you ask me, he's been doing a great job." Stern, who is listed as the girl's father on her birth certificate, initially was battling Birkhead in court over paternity until DNA results proved the child was fathered by Birkhead. A hearing regarding the formal transfer of custody is scheduled for next Friday. "If it were up to me, the formal order in terms of giving Larry full custody would have occurred today, but unfortunately it didn't," Stern said.
