Blonde Ambition (11 page)

   Anna's show would have had men, "young and old, of different ethnicities and orientations," vying for Anna's affections. The "winner" would have gotten to marry her.

   Although their commitment ceremony was officiated by the Baptist minister, no marriage certificate was issued, leading many to speculate that the "commitment" was certainly more for show than it was for substance. Had they actually wanted to get a marriage license, it is a relatively easy process in the Bahamas, much easier, in fact, than getting permanent residency on the island. It's a $40.00 fee with no blood test and only requires that both parties be in the Bahamas at the time of application. The two would have had to provide a form of identification and apply during business hours Monday through Friday at the nearby Office of the Registrar General in Nassau. The only other thing they would have needed was a copy of the death certificate for J. Howard Marshall, since Anna Nicole was widowed.

   If Anna and Howard had wanted to go that route, it would have been entirely possible. But they didn't.

   After the ceremony, Howard blocked outraged attorney Michael Scott and his co-counsel Tracy Ferguson from seeing Anna at the house. Michael Scott sent a note to Howard and Anna reminding them that too much time was passing after Daniel's death without proper burial and that it didn't look good. Arrangements for the next deal, the exclusive on Anna's C-section birth and Anna talking about Daniel's death, were being worked out with
Entertainment Tonight
. A person privy to the behind the scenes negotiations said, "After Anna and Howard were officially cleared to have Daniel buried, he laid there while they worked out their deals. It was disgusting, but it happened."

   The week after the commitment ceremony, Michael Scott announced he was withdrawing as her counsel. "A disagreement on a commercial transaction made it difficult for us to remain as counsel," Scott told the Associated Press. He was very bothered by the
People
magazine pictorial and the fact that the event was held prior to making funeral arrangements for Daniel.

   As of June 2007 there remained a $113,000 unpaid bill for Callender & Co.'s legal services.

The Monday following Anna Nicole and Howard's Bahamian commitment ceremony, the baby drama kicked into high gear. Larry Birkhead officially filed his paternity suit against Anna Nicole Smith, requesting a judge to order Anna Nicole to return "their" daughter Dannielynn to California and immediately submit to a paternity test. He also demanded that both mother and daughter be tested for drugs.

   Larry Birkhead's high-powered attorney Debra Opri said they were asking for legal and physical custody of the little girl Larry vehemently claimed to be his biological daughter. Opri said that Birkhead is "a first time father and he is responding to allegations made by attorney Howard K. Stern on behalf of Anna Nicole Smith, and believes beyond any doubt that he is the father."

   Larry Birkhead appeared with me live on MSNBC's
Scar
borough Country
that night and declared that he was definitely the father. He made some shocking allegations and claimed that Anna Nicole deliberately fled to the Bahamas to avoid custody and visitation issues. It was an eye-opener and it went like this:

rita cosby, host:  We have just learned that, in just the last few hours, Larry Birkhead has filed suit against Anna Nicole Smith and is demanding that a paternity test be ordered to prove his claim that he's the father. Sources tell me that the court filing is explosive, Joe, with some very damning claims against Anna Nicole Smith.

     I've learned that it alleges Anna Nicole Smith was taking methadone and that Howard K. Stern, her attorney, was allegedly facilitating her prescription drug habit, that she fled to the Bahamas after Birkhead suggested that the baby be tested for drugs, and that the filing says Howard K. Stern is claiming paternity for his own financial gain.

     And this one is a real shocker: It alleges that Anna Nicole previously tried to get another man, a third guy, to claim it was his baby several months ago. But get this: That man had a vasectomy.

     Joining me now exclusively is the man who filed this legal action, the man who says he's the real father of Anna Nicole Smith's new baby girl, Larry Birkhead. Larry, why are you taking this legal action now?  larry birkhead, claims he's the father of anna nicole's baby: Well, I have to say, Rita, I was outraged and angry over Howard K. Stern's remarks on
Larry King Live
, where he claimed to be the father of my baby girl. And that really upset me, and I was outraged that he tried to hoodwink the American public—and Larry King, as well—into thinking and believing his story, which was filled with inconsistencies. And it lacked coherency. And it was just outrageous.

cosby: You know, by doing this action, it appears that you feel she's intentionally fleeing to the Bahamas so you can't be a part of this baby's life. Is that how you feel? And how so?

birkhead: I feel that she has deliberately fled to the Bahamas to avoid any talks of custody and visitation. And this was all a highly orchestrated event between herself and her attorney, Howard K. Stern. And I feel that it has to be stopped and the truth needs to be told to the American public that I am the father of this child and all of Howard Stern's lies need to stop right now.

cosby: You know, these allegations against Anna Nicole that I'm told by other sources are in the lawsuit filing are very strong, including the allegation of a drug addiction, these allegations against Anna Nicole, and that the baby may be damaged.

     I spoke with your attorney, Debra Opri, obviously very well known. She's represented a lot of high-profile folks before you. And she had a pretty strong statement I want to show. This is what she said to me. She said, "The public will be very surprised when they learn the details of the lifestyle this baby is going to be faced with if she remains in the current situation."

   Do you believe that the baby's health is at risk, that you're doing what's best for the baby now?

birkhead: Well, I'll let my attorney, you know, stick with the statement that my attorney gave, but I will say that I'm fighting for what I believe in, and that's that I am the father of my baby girl. And I want her to return to the States so that I can maintain a relationship with her and have a relationship with her.

     Right now, I have no rights, no visitation, no rights whatsoever. They were all stripped from me. And again, this was orchestrated between herself and the attorney, and I think that it's time to get to the bottom of it.

cosby: Is there any way Howard K. Stern, who went on national television last week . . .

birkhead: There is absolutely no way that Howard Stern is the father of this child. He knows it; I know it. And that's all there is to it.

     He challenged me on live television to get an attorney, and so I have taken him up on his offer. And it's time to get to the bottom of it, and we will soon see all the lies surrounding this circus that he's taken and he's made out of my birth of my baby daughter.

cosby: You know, in the court filing, I understand from other sources outside of you and your attorney — I understand that Anna Nicole was pregnant with another baby of yours but miscarried last year. Is that true?

birkhead: Well, I'll let the—I think that will come out in time. And I'd rather not comment on that, you know, at this time.

cosby: What do you want to say about your credibility, because he's attacked your credibility? And why are you speaking here tonight?

birkhead: Well, again, it was important for me to get, you know, to the bottom of this whole thing, the circus that they've created, and also just to let people know that, you know, I am a credible person. I was told I was the father. I've been through all of these motions and emotions to prepare for fatherhood. And I think this is just an absolute crime what has been done to me, and I'm ready to fight for my daughter.

cosby: At the end of the day, you believe you will be . . . 100 percent?

birkhead: One hundred and ten percent.

   The following day, Ron Rale, one of Anna's ever-expanding cadre of attorneys fired back: "The truth will be known. Justice will be served."

   "Dannielynn's" birth certificate was redone and Stern was added. According to Bahamian birth certificate number 14598, Howard K. Stern was the proud father. Stern's last name was listed as the baby's last name, even though they were not legally married, even by Bahamian standards. According to Milton Evans, a well-known Bahamian lawyer, "The baby will only take on the father's name if he swears in an affidavit or signifies to the registrar that he is the father, and is prepared for his name to appear on the birth certificate. The mother will also have to be present and confirm that he is the father. So, based on their joint declaration to the birth records officer, that decision will be made to put the name on the certificate as Stern."

   Debra Opri was immediately prepared to file a fraud action against Stern on behalf of her client, Larry Birkhead.

   Interestingly, the rest of Dannielynn Hope Marshall Stern's name was all about tribute: to J. Howard Marshall as the wealthy deceased husband, to Daniel as the dead old brother, to Lynn, her mother's "real life" middle name, and, most of all, proclaimed "Hope" for the future because the present was nothing but a sea of despair.

While Anna remained in seclusion in the Bahamas and Daniel's body awaited proper burial, his friends and family, including his grief-stricken father, Billy Smith, gathered at the First Baptist Church in Anna Nicole's hometown of Mexia, Texas, for a memorial service. Giant green cutouts of the Ninja Turtles greeted about fifty relatives and friends as they arrived at the church to remember the life of the special twenty-year-old.

   Relatives remembered that he loved to play a Texas cowboy. Anna's friend and Daniel's godmother, Jackie Hatten, said that Daniel was a kind young man who kept his nose clean. "Daniel was sweet, sensitive, and very respectful," she told me. "He never cursed, rarely drank, and never wanted to do drugs. I don't think he ever even smoked a cigarette."

Under the blue but slightly cloudy, October Bahamian sky, a dark gold hearse, followed by a procession of three white limousines, slowly made its way down John F. Kennedy Drive to Lakeview Memorial Gardens and Mausoleum in Nassau. The gold hearse carried the body of Daniel Wayne Smith to his final resting place on the Bahamian Island.

   Upon arrival, the mahogany casket carrying the body of young Daniel was pulled from the hearse and carried past six security officers into the cemetery. As ten more officers, dressed discreetly as guests, stood guard, two dozen invited guests or so made their way into the graveyard and stood quietly around the grave, highlighted only by the shadow cast by a green tent, which had been erected for the private ceremony.

   Positioned in front of a white pavilion known as the Citadel, the guests at the graveside service looked strangely out of place in their dark attire on such a beautiful, and warm, Bahamian day. Daniel's sister, six-week-old Dannielynn, was also in attendance, fawned over by family friends and tended to by Anna Nicole's personal assistant. Anna arrived in a black dress and veil created for her by couture designer and close friend Pol Atteu, who had also designed the dress for her commitment ceremony to Howard K. Stern.

   Anna Nicole Smith was inconsolable. She had real problems accepting that Daniel was gone. In fact, Ben Thompson said the day Daniel died in the hospital, a few hours after she was home and her sedation drugs wore off, Anna had walked out of the bedroom into the living room where Ben and Howard were. "Where's Daniel?" she asked. "Where's he at?" Then, she pointed at his suitcase and said, "There's his bag."

   "It stunned us," Ben Thompson remembers. "She still thought Daniel was alive. We looked at each other and took her into the bedroom. Howard told her what happened and it was like Daniel died all over again."

• • •

Just before Daniel's funeral was to begin, Anna demanded that the casket be opened. In front of the small crowd, she sobbed uncontrollably and reached into the coffin, grabbing onto Daniel's body clad in his favorite clothing: a pair of jeans, t-shirt, and a trucker hat. She was hugging her dead son, clinging to him. It was an extraordinarily anguishing moment to see a mother in such pain.

Daniel had been dead for thirty-nine days.

• • •

Even more shocking perhaps, Quethlie Alexis and Nadine Alexie told investigators that when Howard tried to console Anna and gently get her to release Daniel's body, she looked right at Howard and screamed, "You caused this! You did this. Get away from me, you bastard!" It was a surprising and uncomfortable moment for the small crowd.

   "If Daniel has to be buried," she cried, "I want to be buried with him!" She was trying to go down with Daniel into the grave right then and had to be pulled from his dead body.

   The tragic wailing and crying coming from within the tent could be heard throughout the cemetery, drowning out much of Howard K. Stern's eulogy in honor of Daniel. Anna had asked Daniel's friends to write letters that were placed in the casket, along with a photo of her with Daniel, and a rosary that had been blessed by the Pope. Those present shared words of love, sadness, and grief, but Anna was absolutely overwhelmed by her loss. Howard K. Stern would say in a statement released after the funeral, "Anna Nicole laid her son to rest today. It was the most difficult day of her entire life."

   The program given out at the service was filled with pictures of Anna and Daniel saying he was like "a comet, blazing across the evening sky" who "died too soon like a rainbow fading." Also included was a personal note from Anna to her son. "My dearest son Daniel," Anna wrote, "You were my rock. You were the only one who could keep me solid. Why God took you away from me now I do not understand. Perhaps someday I will. It is so hard to think of you, but I do every second."