News / Entertainment
Anna Nicole Smith Body to Remain in Florida for DNA Testing
The body of the former Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith is to remain in Florida until DNA testing has been conducted. The death of the 39-year-old blonde has sparked a battle between Smith’s partner, Howard K. Stern, and former boyfriend Larry Birkhead. Both men have claimed to be the father of Anna Nicole Smith’s five-month old daughter, Dannielynn.
Anna Nicole Smith died on Feb. 8 and since that time both Stern and Birkhead have been pulling in opposite directions. Stern was with Smith when she gave birth to Dannielynn in the Bahamas last September. It is Stern’s name that appears on the baby girl’s birth certificate.
But Birkhead has been fighting for a DNA test for some time. The professional photographer and former boyfriend had been asking for a paternity test since the birth of Dannielynn.
On Wednesday Circuit Judge Lawrence Korda ordered that the body of Anna Nicole Smith remain in Florida until a DNA test can be administered. Birkhead’s lawyers had feared that if the body had been released and moved out of state it would ruin the potential for accurate testing.
Virgie Arthur, the mother of Anna Nicole Smith, has asked for the release of her daughter so that she may have a proper funeral. She fears that if the delays continue it will not be possible to have a viewing for her daughter’s funeral.
Dannielynn stands to inherit millions from the estate of Anna Nicole Smith.
