A FLORIDA appeals court has suspended a lower court ruling that would have allowed the burial of former Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith in the Bahamas, as the battle over her baby shifted to the Bahamian capital. The Fourth District Court of Appeal in West Palm Beach granted an emergency petition by Smith's mother, Virgie Arthur, to stop a court-appointed guardian for Smith's five-month-old daughter from taking the body to the islands, where Smith lived the final months of her life. The legal manoeuvring further delayed a funeral for Smith, the buxom tabloid star who died suddenly at age 39 on February 8 at a Florida casino hotel. Her decomposing body remains at a medical examiner's office in Dania Beach, Florida. Ms Arthur wants Smith buried in her native Texas.
Ms Arthur's appeal seeks to overturn a ruling by Broward County Judge Larry Seidlin last week following an emotional week-long hearing to determine who had the right to bury the former topless dancer and billionaire's widow. Smith's death touched off a legal firestorm over the body and custody of her baby, Dannielynn. The appellate court's ruling halted the transfer of the body temporarily and asked lawyers in the case to respond by tomorrow afternoon to Ms Arthur's appeal.
Judge Seidlin ruled that Smith's daughter was her legal next of kin and ordered her remains turned over to Miami lawyer Richard Milstein, who was appointed as Dannielynn's guardian to protect the rights of the baby during legal proceedings. Mr Milstein said he was arranging to bury Smith beside her son Daniel, who died last year, in the Bahamas. In Nassau, lawyers for Ms Arthur and Smith's former boyfriend Larry Birkhead, who says he is the baby's biological father, went to court for a procedural hearing in a custody fight over the child.
