As the Anna Nicole story has even more twists and turns, I’m trying to decide if I give a shit anymore. Of course her body is unburied amid issues over who has control over the burial and two different court orders demanding Anna stick around until further rulings on DNA testing for Dannielynn’s paternity. It will probably hang around for weeks while the court cases drag on, rivalling her son’s record of 39 days between death and burial, and James Brown’s wait for a final resting place of 50 days and counting.

Anna’s mom Virgie Arthur has hired a Florida-based lawyer to try to get Anna’s body released for burial as soon as possible. Larry Birkhead’s court rulings prevent the corpse from being buried before a further ruling on February 20th. Arthur supports Birkhead’s paternity claim and it seems like she would want to work along with him in his quest to get DNA from Anna’s body. Also vying for Anna’s body are her lawyers. They told Birkhead that they would give him DNA from Anna if he would release the body, but they won’t give him the baby’s DNA and don’t seem to have much clout in the matter compared to her mother

Her mother is also trying in her trash-talking way to gain control of the half-billion dollar baby Anna barred her from seeing while she was still able to do so. She obtained an injunction from a Bahamian court that prevents Howard K Stern from leaving the country with the tot and filed a complaint with police that the baby is not safe in Howard’s custody.

Anna’s estranged mom said she didn’t want control of Dannielynn, but that she didn’t want Howard K Stern to have her, either. She said she thinks Larry Birkhead is the father and that he should be caring for the girl. A friend of Anna’s mom said “There’s two common denominators in the deaths of her daughter and her grandchild – drugs and Howard K. Stern,” which seems to explain why she doesn’t think the baby is safe in his care.

Meanwhile the 911 tapes have been released, and are rather boring. No one seems particularly excited or distraught over the fact that Anna is unresponsive, and the 911 operator isn’t impressed when told that she’s responding to a call for Anna Nicole Smith.

And a traffic ticket in which Larry Birkhead explained his speeding to a police officer by saying “I got a call from my pregnant girlfriend, she’s sick,” may be just the evidence he needs in his paternity case for Dannielynn. The officer actually wrote down “wife,” instead of girlfriend, and Birkhead’s spontaneous response may be seen as evidence that he believes he’s the father and is not just in it for the money.

I really thought that the Anna Nicole Smith tale could not get any stranger, but I was wrong. It turns out she was involved with a heroin trafficking diet doctor in the late 90s who got sent off to federal prison right around the time Howard K. Stern entered the picture. Bear with me as this side story is complicated in itself. The guy was an Iranian-born Swedish citizen who went by Dr. Ben Khan and was a “dietician” to the stars. His real name was Ben Buicksson, and he had a side career as a mobster drug trafficker who dealt in heroin.

Dr. Ben was wanted in Italy for a 1990 charge of smuggling heroin. He fled to Sweden and then ended up in Beverly Hills where he set up shop and hooked up with Anna. Anna started hanging out with lawyer Howard K. Stern in February, 1997 when Dr. Ben was suddenly nabbed by the feds for that 1990 charge in Italy. He spent ten years in a federal detention center in LA before being deported to Sweden just one month ago. Rumor has it that he was able to run his drug business from jail, and that may have contributed to his deportation, although I’m just speculating.

Anyway while his plane was on route to Sweden it had to stop off in Rome for a refueling, and the Italian police, likely tipped off by the feds, forced their way onto the plane and nabbed the guy so he could serve the ten years he owed them!

Anna was with Dr. Ben right around the time she met Howard K Stern, and credited him with helping her lose a ton of weight in the late 90s. It seems she went back to a tried a true method to break her food addiction by turning to the heroin substitute methadone most recently – with Howard K Stern supplying her in Dr. Ben’s stead. (No offense to Trimspa, they just picked a terrible spokesperson, although they’re getting a lot of mileage out of it.)

Did Howard K Stern turn in Dr. Ben? Probably, just like he is thought to have convinced Anna to ditch Larry Birkhead and move to the Bahamas with him while she was pregnant.

Celebrity photo agency Celebrities.com, which tells this sordid tale, offers the conspiracy theory that Dr. Ben was outraged at being turned in by Stern and that his seizure by Italian police reopened old wounds. They say he may have had a hand in Anna’s death by sending one of his minions to do the deed. That’s doubtful, but it is an interesting story from her past, and gives even more insight as to the craziness she was involved in and the lengths that slug Howard K Stern went to in order to keep her in his clutches.

Header picture and story courtesy of Celebrities.com.

Now a fifth potential father of deceased Anna Nicole Smith’s sole heir, Dannielynn Smith, has thrown his hat into the ring. Anna’s hot but dumb former bodyguard, Alexander Denk, (not the one who was with her when she died) says he had a two year affair with her after he was hired to play the chef on The Anna Nicole Show and subsequently became her bodyguard. He told the tabloid news program Extra that “there’s always a possibility” that he’s Dannielynn’s father when the interviewer directly questioned him about it.

He didn’t sound convinced to me, but he’s hired a Beverly Hills lawyer to represent him in yet another suit claiming paternity of the 1/2 billion dollar baby.

Other potential fathers include Anna’s ex boyfriend, Larry Birkhead, her lawyer turned creepy confidant, Howard K Stern, (who now has possession of the baby at the couple’s squatter mansion in the Bahamas), Zsa Zsa Gabor’s husband, Prince Frederic Von Anhalt, and Anna’s long-deceased second husband, oil billionaire J Howard Marshall. Anna’s half-sister claimed that Anna wanted to freeze his sperm so that she could get pregnant with his baby and cinch her claim on his hundreds of millions. I doubt that Anna had the foresight or ability to plan all that out, but it’s a remote possibility.

Prince Von Asshat is the wild card, and it’s generally assumed that he’s claiming paternity to seek publicity for some reason.

And it’s possible that none of these guys is the father, as Anna was said to have used male hookers around the time that Dannielynn was conceived.

Anna’s Austrian bodyguard lover said that she suffered from what the interviewer called “life threatening seizures” that she was on medication for. He said in the preview available of his interview on the Extra website that he didn’t believe she died from drugs and that she was just “exhausted.”

Anna’s secret medical condition was not revealed, and I’m not sure if the buff bodyguard knows what it’s called exactly. I did look up the complications from too much methadone, and they include seizures, so it’s possible she was just occasionally suffering from too much of the stuff that helped her slim down so quickly.

Intentional or accidental overdose of methadone can lead to unconsciousness, coma, or death. The signs of methadone overdose include confusion, difficulty speaking, seizures, severe nervousness or restlessness, severe dizziness, severe drowsiness, and/or slow or troubled breathing. These symptoms are increased by alcohol or other central nervous system (CNS) depressants.

It’s not so much of a stretch to assume that’s what caused Anna’s death, but with so many crazy details in this case it’s hard to know what to believe.

Meanwhile pictures have surfaced of Anna canoodling with the Bahamiam immigration minister who fast-tracked her residency application, and Anna’s final footage with Dannielynn is set to air on Entertainment Tonight.

TMZ has obtained photos from inside Anna Nicole’s fridge in the suite where she died. She had Slimfast products right beside Trimspa, for which she was the spokesperson. The real secret of Anna’s quick slim-down was also in her fridge, methadone.

The refrigerator, which was inside Anna Nicole’s bedroom in the Bahamas, contained methadone (5 mg per 5 ml). The small refrigerator contained cans of Slim-Fast– ironic, since Smith was TRIMSPA’s spokesperson. Several bottles of TRIMSPA sat right next to the fridge.

The fridge also contained Miracle 2000 (marketed as a nutritional supplement for “today’s active lifestyle”), French’s Worcestershire Sauce, yogurt and spray butter. It also appears there are vials of injectable medicines.

Methadone was one of a deadly cocktail of drugs found in her son Daniel’s system when he died. It was said to have been supplied to him by Howard K. Stern, who some have called Anna’s “dealer.”

Anna is said to have had recent surgery to repair one of her breast implants. It is unknown whether that contributed to her death or to the flu-like symptoms that preceeded it.

TMZ also reports that the coroner said no alcohol was found in her stomach, and that her stomach did not smell like alcohol despite hotel bar patrons’ reports that she was pounding down shots on the night of her death. The coroner is also said to have disputed the earlier story that some of the prescriptions in the room were in Howard K. Stern’s name. He said that all drugs found were all in Anna’s name.

In case you’re worried that we’ll soon be subjected to leaked photos of Anna Nicole’s bloated corpse, there’s a law in Florida that was enacted after Dale Earnhardt’s death that is supposed to shield us from seeing those pictures.

Oh, and the headstone on Anna’s son’s grave is for some other person. She supposedly put it there to keep her mother from visiting her grandson Daniel’s grave.

Howard K. Stern’s behavior in the hours after Anna’s death may be considered odd by some, but it’s not much of a change from what he was doing before Anna died. Instead of flying back to the Bahamas where the infant daughter of his supposed lover was staying with his family, he sailed back on a new boat he recently purchased with Anna. Once in the Bahamas, he promptly snatched back the mansion that Anna borrowed from a peeved ex boyfriend.

He also got paid big bucks for his first exclusive interview after her death.

The new boat and sail back to the Bahamas
Howard and Anna had just purchased a 40 foot sport yacht they called “The Cracker,” which they were in the process of outfitting with flat screen TVs and fabrics selected by an interior decorator. The last owner of the ten year-old boat said that Anna like the fact that there were two bedrooms. Instead of flying from Florida to the Bahamas, Stern sailed back on that new boat. It seems odd to me, but he may have wanted the solitude.

The high-paid interview
People are ripping on Stern for selling his story right after Anna died by submitting to an interview with Entertainment Tonight to be aired tonight, and undoubtedly dragged out over the week. This is no different from Anna and Howard’s behavior after Daniel’s death, in which they sold his last pictures to a photo agency. In fact Anna and Howard held a “commitment ceremony” in order to sell the pictures before they could even be bothered to bury Daniel, who was finally laid to rest 39 days after his death.

Howard told ET that he wouldn’t let Anna’s mom, who is now in the Bahamas, even see her grandchild, and said “As long as I have a breath in my body, that woman will not see Dannielynn.”

He was said to be upset and crying a lot, but that didn’t stop him from cashing in on her death right away.

Snatching back the borrowed mansion
After Anna’s death, G. Ben Thompson, the rightful owner of the mansion where she was squatting in the Bahamas before she went to Florida to defend her daughter’s paternity, had the locks changed on his estate. It appears he had no legal right to do this, as Stern promptly had them changed back and filed a complaint with police over missing items, which included computers and art in the house.

The wedding scheduled for two weeks out
In the interview with ET, it is casually mentioned that Howard and Anna were playing a real for-keeps wedding that was to happen just two weeks after Anna died. It could just be a coincidence that Anna died before that wedding happened, or maybe she was trying to avoid it, subconsciously or not.

The Anna Nicole death saga is as complicated and messed up as one would expect given the subject. There are all sorts of rumors, angles, and legal issues to the story that it’s hard to determine what’s relevant enough to cover. I’ll try to break it down by subject and get to as much as I can. The more I hear about it, the more it seems like Anna died from natural causes hastened by a lot of booze. It seems like drugs are involved, of course, but the coroner says no pills were found in her stomach or the initial blood work. It’s hard to judge if Anna was a victim of foul play, as several people had something to gain if she died.

Even more people are coming out of the woodwork with their own claims about Dannielynn’s paternity, which may seem preposterous at first glance, but with Anna you just never know. And of course everyone wants a piece of that little girl, whether they’re a potential father, friend, or relative.

Autopsy
In terms of the autopsy, the death is still unexplained. The coroner says that there was no evidence of trauma or asphixiation and that no drugs were found in Anna’s stomach or in the preliminary blood tests. He doesn’t rule out drugs as a cause or contributing factor in her death, though. He speculates that Anna died from natural causes, drugs or a combination of both, but says he won’t know until the results are final in 3-5 weeks. (The CNN report said that toxicology results were pending, while a FOX news story claims that initial blood work found no drugs. I think these two accounts are compatible.)

There were said to be “subtle findings” with her heart and GI tract, but it is unknown exactly what this entails and it does not seem to be significant enough to have caused her death.

Drugs in the Room
While CNN reports that only prescription drugs were in the room, they say there were a lot of them and that some were in Anna’s lawyer/lover Howard K. Stern’s name. This is to be expected if he was staying there too, but it still sounds suspicious to me.

Authorities investigating Smith’s death retrieved a “large amount” of prescription medicine from her hotel room, law enforcement sources familiar with the investigation said.

The prescription drugs were in the name of Smith’s lawyer and boyfriend, Howard K. Stern, and included Valium and antibiotics, a law enforcement source said. Over-the-counter drugs, including cold and flu medicines, also reportedly were found.

Star paints a grimmer picture of the drugs in Anna’s room, and claims a person on the scene says it looked like a pharmacy and that there was a lot of the heroine substitute methadone:

Star has learned exclusively that a source on the scene of Anna Nicole Smith’s medical crisis at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel described her hotel room as “walking into a pharmacist’s shop. There were bottles and bottles of pills!”

The source claims that prescription medication found at the scene included the stimulant Provigil, the anti-anxiety drug Xanax, the powerful pain reliever Vicodin, and the morphine-like pain reliever Methadone — “a lot of Methadone,” the source reports.

This would not be surprising considering that Anna’s ex Larry Birkhead claimed she was addicted to methadone and that methadone was said to be in her son Daniel’s system when he died of a drug interaction last year.

Anna’s Last Days and her Private Nurse
Anna was seen pounding back double shots by patrons at the bar of her hotel the night she died. She got so wasted she had to be carried back to her room by her bodyguard and Howard K. Stern.

The last person who interviewed her, Mark Steines of Entertainment Tonight, said that on Tuesday she had a temperature of 105 and was put in an ice bath. On Wednesday her temperature was said to be down, and she slipped in the bathtub and hit her head.

The coroner did not mention a bump on the head, but said she did have a small bruise on her back that was thought to have been caused by the bathtub fall.

I have not been able to find information about why she had a personal nurse apart from the fact that she’d been having “flu like symptoms” in the week before her death. I have not heard anything about a chronic illness or disorder that would call for a nurse.

Paternity of Dannielynn
While the psuedo-prince husband of Zsa Zsa Gabor has tossed his hat into the ring, claiming he’s the father of Dannielynn because he was shagging Anna at the time of conception, a fourth option beyond Birkhead and Stern ups the craziness factor several fold. Anna’s half-sister, Donna Hogan, claims in a book manuscript that Anna’s long-dead husband, billionaire J. Howard Marshall, could be the father of Dannielynn because Anna “always talked of freezing [Howard’s] sperm”

Larry Birkhead’s suit claiming paternity of Dannielynn continues, and Anna’s remains have been ordered to be preserved until February 20th for another ruling in the case. It is thought that DNA may be needed from Anna’s body, but a request for immediate DNA samples from Anna has been denied.

Custody of Dannielynn
Five month-old Dannielynn is being cared for by Anna’s companion Howard K. Stern’s mother and sister in the Bahamas. The infant was not with Anna when she died, and was back in the Bahamas being watched by a friend of Anna’s.

It is thought that Anna Nicole’s mother, who never hesitated to talk smack about her when she was alive and is now saying that drugs caused her daughter’s death, is seeking custody of Dannielyn. She is in the Bahamas, and was seen leaving a police station shortly after her arrival.

Larry Birkhead’s request for immediate custody of Dannielynn following Anna’s death has been denied by an LA judge.

Anna’s Will
Anna’s former lawyer, Howard K. Stern, is the executor of her will, which was drawn up before Daniel died and names her now-deceased son Daniel as her heir. It is thought that Dannielynn now stands to inherit Anna’s tabloid earnings, which would explain the many people who are vying for custody and/or paternity of the infant.

TMZ cites a legal expert that says that it will all be complicated, of course, and that it depends on the paternity suit and if Howard and Anna’s weird commitment ceremony is found to be legally binding. They also say that Stern is not legally allowed to inherit everything while being the executor of the will.

I tried to look this up, but it’s confusing and I’m not sure if Stern can appoint someone else to be the executor of the will, unless the will specifically states so. I think he can say he no longer wants to be the executor, although it seems like the court will name someone if there’s no provision for it in the will. Since he probably wrote the will there must be a loophole in there somewhere. If you have a legal background, please let me know if I’m correct about how this works.

Anna’s bullshit past and fixation on fame
Anna Nicole’s mother said that her daughter fabricated a hard-knock past in order to make her life story more sensational. She says Anna comes from a middle class family in Houston, Texas, not a bunch of poor hicks in the countryside as she claimed.

She said Anna told her she would do whatever it took to get press, and that she said ‘Mom, if my name is out there in the news, good or bad, doesn’t matter, good or bad, I make money, so I’m going to do whatever it takes.” Indeed it seems like she took that promise a little too far.

Here is Anna in 1993 as the voluptuous face of Guess jeans. Thanks to marlies84 on Oh No They Didn’t! for finding these.

WCBS New York reports

while searching Anna Nicole Smith’s hotel room late Thursday afternoon investigators found two key pieces of evidence — illegal narcotics and prescription medications.

Now, a toxicology report will determine whether one of these drugs or a combination of both substances contributed to her death. An autopsy is scheduled for Friday morning in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Smith, 39, collapsed and was unresponsive while staying at the Seminole Hard Rock Cafe Hotel and Casino, said the attorney, Ron Rale. She was rushed to Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood, Fla.

The press generally seems to be treating her death as a final sad chapter. There’s a lot still up in the air … the paternity suit from ex-boyfriend Larry Birkhead over her new born daughter; the authorities in the Bahamas are about to open an investigation into her young son’s overdose death next month; the family of elderly billionaire J. Howard Marshall II, continue their legal battle over Anna Nicole’s inheritance of his money.

Those are just the big one’s … and how they will progress, cross-over, be stalled and be complicated by her death awaits to be seen. The conspiracy theories are already in progress. They certainly have plenty to work with … its going to be a bit of an industry in the coming months.

Estranged from most of her family and surrounded by a randomly assembled reality tv menagerie these last years: the saddest footnote comes from an interview shot about ten days in her home in the Bahamas

“Everyone in my life has stabbed me in my back, or said something bad about me or sued me,” she told The Insider.

There’s no arguing with that

via WCBS
pics via KBTV4

Update by Celebitchy: Apparently only prescription drugs were found in Anna Nicole’s room and earlier reports that there were narcotics in the room were false. The coroner reports that she either died from natural causes, drugs, or a combination of both. Final results from the autopsy are expected in 4-6 weeks.

Anna Nicole Smith lived her tragic life in front of the cameras. She launched her career with an appearance on the cover of Playboy (after undoubtedly doing some favors for Hugh), was the trashy face of Guess jeans, starred in on a goofy reality show on E!, sold photos of her son’s last days, and even aired the video footage of her C-Section. Anna capitalized on her questionable fame by cashing in our interest in her car crash life.

She was working the afternoon strip shift when a then-married Smith met her husband, octogenarian billionaire J. Howard Marshall, in 1991. She divorced her other husband in 1993, married Marshall in mid 1994, and when he died just 13 months after they were married, she launched a prolonged legal battle for his estate that still continues to this day.

She had various well documented legal trouble, the most bothersome of which may have been her ex’s fight to establish paternity of her baby daughter, Dannielynn. The deadline for Anna to submit the infant to paternity testing had already passed, with Anna’s lawyer’s attempting a legal shell game to delay the tests. It must have weighed on her heavily.

The investigation by Bahamian authorities into her creepy lawyer’s role in the death of her son was about to start, and it’s not too much of a stretch to assume that she was worried about what they might find.

Anna was widely rumored to be addicted to the heroin substitute methadone, and a similar kind of drug interaction that was responsible for her son Daniel’s death may be to blame for her demise.

Anna may have even been pregnant when she met a suspicious end in a Florida hotel room. She made a joke on Entertainment Tonight that she might be pregnant, and said “oh, did I say that?” afterwards. She mentioned that creepy hanger-on Howard K Stern wanted another baby, a boy, but that she wasn’t ready yet.

Was Anna pregnant at the time of her death? Was she the victim of foul play? We’ll have to wait and see with this story, and with all the drama in Anna’s life there are sure to be plenty of twists and turns to come.

Here are our last few articles about Anna, and some random pictures of her. The ones of Howard K Stern feeding her a drink are the most recent. RIP Anna.
Anna Nicole made her filthy bed
Anna Nicole is pimping out her baby
Anna Nicole Smith got a new tattoo
Anna Nicole can’t flash her crotch, so she claims to be preggers again
Anna Nicole Smith’s C-Section (severe warning)
Anna Nicole is as annoying as Madonna

This is just horrible news. Anna Nicole Smith has died at the age of 39 after collapsing in her hotel room in Hollywood, Florida.

The blond bombshell — who recently became tabloid fodder all over again after the sudden, apparently drug-related death of her 20-year-old son — was found unresponsive while staying at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino, said her attorney, Ron Rale. She was rushed to a hospital.

Edwina Johnson, chief investigator of the Broward County Medical Examiner’s Office, said the cause of death is under investigation and an autopsy will be done on Friday………..

Meanwhile, the paternity of her now 5-month-old daughter remained a matter of dispute. The birth certificate lists Dannielynn’s father as attorney Howard K. Stern, Smith’s most recent companion. Smith’s ex-boyfriend Larry Birkhead was waging a legal challenge, saying he was the father.

Debra Opri, the attorney who filed his paternity suit, said Birkhead “is devastated. He is inconsolable, and we are taking steps now to protect the DNA testing of the child. The child is our number one priority.”

I really hope she didn’t kill herself. After all, she had a beautiful baby girl who counted on her, I can’t imagine how hard it’s going to be for Dannielynn to grow up without her. I hope the two daddies involved in the paternity suit find a civilized way to solve their issues and help Dannielynn have a chance at a normal life.

Note by Celebitchy: Thanks so much to Chic Mommy for covering this. I am on vacation in Spain with my family until Monday, and do have internet access from our room. This is incredibly shocking news. Like a lot of you, my first thought was that Howard K. Stern killed her to cash in on some kind of insurance and to avoid being revealed as a hanger-on who isn’t the father of Dannielynn. It’s possible that she died of a drug overdose or natural causes, we’ll have to wait for the results. There’s also a suspect rumor that her deceased son is the father of her baby, but I doubt that’s true. If there is any merit to that rumor, it would certainly give her motive to commit suicide.

Here are pictures from Anna’s commitment ceremony to Howard.

Trashtastic Anna Nicole has more well-deserved legal trouble in a month than most of us see in a lifetime. She has a newborn baby she claims was spawned by her parasitic lawyer turned boyfriend, Howard K Stern, who most likely provided her teenaged son with the heroin substitute that killed him in a lethal drug interaction. Stern is under investigation for the death by the Bahamian government, where he and Anna fled in a ploy to deny the other guy paternity rights.

There is witness who claims that Stern gave Anna’s son the dose of methadone that killed him, and that he saw Stern flush the rest of the drugs down the toilet after Daniel died. Details will supposedly come out at an inquest on March 26, where more than 20 witnesses will be called to testify.

Now the self-proclaimed father of Anna’s baby, Larry Birkhead, has a legal case ordering her to submit to paternity testing by today, January 23rd. Anna’s desperate lawyers are trying all sorts of legal shell games to avoid the test, even though Howard K Stern told Larry King that Anna would submit to it “if legally compelled.”

Anna is also being sued by her former lawyers for non-payment of their massive bills in a case that claims she habitually avoids paying her creditors.

Plus she’s about to get evicted from her Bahamian home for failing to pay rent. Anna says the rich guy who owns the home, who she once tried to pin paternity of the baby on but failed when she was told he was sterile, gave her the house as a gift, while he says Anna’s a dirty squatter.

Bitch is about to get owned, and she still doesn’t have her grubby paws on the 1/2 a billion she thinks she’s owed for jerking off an 89 year-old man for a year.