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From: Solitairea1
Date: Friday, February 16, 2007
Time: 09:15:40 PM
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/gossip/story/497940p-419750c.html ============================= Anna seen dressing for death Worked on frock for burial - lawyer ============= BY ANGELA MOSCONI SPECIAL TO THE DAILY NEWS ========== FT. LAUDERDALE - Morbid and obsessed with death, Anna Nicole Smith had picked out a dress for her own burial, a lawyer said yesterday during a contentious court hearing over the former centerfold's remains. Probate Judge Larry Seidlin sought to maintain a semblance of order as impassioned outbursts punctuated the packed hearing in Broward County Circuit Court. So many lawyers attended that there weren't enough seats for them all. Smith's mother, Virgie Arthur, wants to have the reality TV star buried in her home state of Texas. Howard K. Stern, Smith's lawyer-turned-lover, wants her buried in the Bahamas. And Larry Birkhead, who, like Stern, claims to be the father of Smith's infant daughter, wants DNA from the body preserved for his paternity suit. Although Broward County Medical Examiner Dr. Joshua Perper said he had taken "more than enough" samples for DNA tests, the judge ordered another mouth swab taken from the body, which has been lying in the morgue since Smith, 39, died Feb. 8 in a Florida hotel room. "We want to show respect and dignity to the body of Ms. Smith," said Seidlin. "Beauty was important to her. She wants to look beautiful and we want to make sure that occurs." **************** Stern's lawyers said Smith would want to be buried with her 20-year-old son, Daniel, who died of a drug overdose Sept. 10, just three days after his mom gave birth to baby Dannielynn. Her son's death apparently led Smith to morbid thoughts of her own demise. Attorney Ron Rale said Stern had told him that Smith had been working with a seamstress on a dress for her own funeral. "There's a dress Anna Nicole had, the dressmaker had been preparing a dress," Rale said. ************* Another of Stern's attorneys, Krista Barth, lit into Arthur for trying to claim her daughter's body when the two had been estranged for years. "The woman sitting away from me has never laid eyes on her daughter in 12 years and wants to take her home to Texas," Barth sid. "It's sad and it's sick." Dressed in black, Arthur clutched her husband's hand and wiped away tears during the hearing. Outside court, Arthur told the Daily News all she wants is "peace" for her daughter. The judge said the main focus should be on 5-month-old Dannielynn, who could potentially inherit the millions Smith claimed from the estate of her second husband, oilman J. Howard Marshall, who died in 1995 at age 90. Seidlin said he hoped to appoint a Miami attorney to represent her interests. "The overriding issue is the welfare of her child," the judge said. "She's at the center of this maze." Arthur's attorneys said they will go before a Bahamian court next week seeking custody of her granddaughter. Further complicating matters, another claimant, Prince Frederic von Anhalt, Zsa Zsa Gabor's husband, filed legal documents in California seeking a DNA test to determine whether he is Dannielynn's daddy. Seidlin said attorneys would return today to discuss embalming Smith's body. There's another hearing before a different judge on Birkhead's motions regarding paternity issues. ============ With Rich Schapiro in Nassau, Bahamas Originally published on February 16, 2007