Blonde Ambition (27 page)

   From 12:27 p.m. to 1:40 p.m. is obviously not "immediately." It is also interesting to note that both Moe and his wife initially referred to 12:30, or about fifteen minutes after Moe left the room.

   Tas said when she spoke to Moe on the phone, "I don't like what I'm seeing. Anna has purple splotches on her face and body. She's not breathing and looks blue."

   "Blue?" Moe asked.

   Dr. Howard Adelman, former Deputy Chief Medical Examiner for Suffolk County, New York, said the purple splotches that Tas described on Anna's face is "because the blood is not oxygenating. They could appear as soon as three to four minutes after someone dies. Soon after the heart stops beating, you begin to see these."

    "When I blew into her, I heard a gurgling sound," Tas remembered. "I told Moe I knew it was not good."

   Tas "knew the gurgling sound was the sound you hear after people are already dead." She told private investigators, "I've seen many dead people. That's what happens when people are settling." She believes "Anna was already dead for some time" and even suggested that "Anna may have been dead for several hours." In fact, Tas recently confided to private investigators that, looking back, she now remembers "Anna's skin color didn't look right" when she first walked in the room, but she "didn't put it together until Brigitte looked closely at Anna later."

   Brigitte Neven, the woman who found Anna's lifeless body and brought it to Tas's attention, told me Anna's body was still warm, which forensics experts say does not necessarily mean she just died. "She could've been dead anywhere from a few minutes up to twelve hours," Dr. Adelman said. "Because she was wrapped in a heavy bed cover, her body could remain warm for three to four hours after she died. She had a 105degree fever on Monday. Even if it dropped to 100 degrees on Tuesday, it could've spiked back up to 105 degrees or higher before she died, especially if she had an infection. Such a high fever right before death, as well as her being insulated in a heavy blanket, could cause her body to stay warm to the touch for up to twelve hours. It takes time for someone's temperature to drop, especially if they are wrapped in a warm blanket." Remember, Anna was found cocooned head to toe in a down comforter and duvet cover.

   It was also many minutes or more until medical help was contacted. When private investigators asked Tas how as a nurse she could let so much time pass before 911 was called, she said, "I don't know. I just thought to call my husband. I was panicking."

   Moe said that after the initial call from his wife, there were no other calls between them before he got back to the room. This is false as there was a flurry of calls between all the parties, yet incredibly, no calls directly to 911. Remember that the reason Moe says he didn't call 911 directly was that his cell phone was registered to a different county in Florida and because he claimed he did not know the address of the Hard Rock, a place he'd been to frequently.

• • •

Tas said she was shocked that Dr. Perper asked her only a few questions: "Did you give Anna any medications?" "What did you see?" and "Did you see her move?" Dr. Perper didn't talk to Brigitte Neven according to his own report, and she was the woman who actually first found Anna unconscious.

   A few other things have bothered Tas since that horrible day. When they all went into the room at 11:54 a.m. the morning Anna died, she says Howard did something that seemed calculated. He positioned his body between the two rooms in such a manner that his visitors—King Eric, Brigitte, and Tas— had a blocked view into Anna's bedroom. She also thought it was strange that Howard didn't want to leave Anna to go pick up King Eric and Brigitte at the airport, but then suddenly soon after that, left Anna to go look at the boat.

   She also made a surprising discovery. When she sat in one of two chairs at the foot of Anna's bed to work on the computer, she noticed Howard's computer was on and open on the floor to the right of the chair. A $37,000 wire transfer he had made that morning was still illuminated on the screen. Tas says she was on the phone with Moe when she saw the wire transfer message. (Police did check Howard's computer for e-mails sometime after her death, but were not informed of any wire transfers and therefore did not check for any.) Both the boat broker and handyman know of no large amount like this that would have been associated with the boat.

   Perhaps most disconcerting was that there was a baby bottle positioned on top of Anna with the same orange-brown residue in it as the jug on the nightstand. The contents of both the baby bottle and the jug were tested and it turned out to be Pedialyte, an oral electrolyte maintenance solution, specially formulated for children with diarrhea and vomiting. Tas said the baby bottle bothered her very much. It wasn't the contents that troubled her. She believes "the baby bottle was planted . . . if Anna was truly just sleeping, it would've fallen off the minute she moved because of the strange position it was in." The baby bottle was lying slanted on Anna's shoulder and neck on top of the covers. "There's no way she put it there herself."

• • •

In addition, Dr. Khris Eroshevich has cause for concern, which may be why she refused to talk to Seminole Police. To have someone under your medical supervision with a raging 105degree temperature and not take her to the hospital is deadly dangerous. "The only adults I have seen with a fever of 105 degrees are suffering from heat exhaustion/heat stroke, are extraordinarily ill, or near death," Dr. Keith Eddleman told me. His practice at Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York City sees more than 17,000 patients a year. "That is an astronomically high fever, seizure range. If someone arrives at the hospital with that high of a temperature, it's a medical emergency. You summon everybody to get that body temperature down. As a doctor, to not seek emergency care for one of your patients with a 105-degree temperature, you are asking for medical malpractice problems."

   Add this to the laundry list of prescription drugs Dr. Khris provided for Anna under numerous names, and one can see why the California Medical Board and the Federal Drug Enforcement Administration opened an investigation into Dr. Khris.

   Fox News quoted Dr. Chip Walls, a forensic toxicologist for the Miller School of Medicine at the University of Miami, who said chloral hydrate is rarely prescribed and is known to be fatal if combined with certain other drugs—including the sedative Lorazepam, which the autopsy showed Anna was taking, also given to her by Dr. Khris. "It's very toxic if you mix it with any other central nervous system depressant drugs," Walls said. "You could get profound sedation leading up to coma and respiratory arrest."

   Though Dr. Khris refused to talk to Seminole Police, she was willing to talk to
Entertainment Tonight
. In fact, as the
En
tertainment Tonight
crew, including host Mark Steines, boarded a plane to fly to Florida the night of Anna's death, Dr. Khris joined them. "When the news broke of Anna's death—I truly didn't believe it," Mark Steines wrote on his Internet blog. "We were all quite literally crushed when we were told the news by people close to Anna. I immediately boarded a plane to Florida along with Khristine Eroshevich, Anna's close confidant, who got me up to speed on the last moments of Anna's life. She told me who was there, what Howard was going through and why the paternity battle Anna had been suffering through was literally too much for her to bear."

   It seemed as if Dr. Khris—like other "Anna close confidants," including Howard K. Stern, Alex Goen, and Ron Rale — was already positioning Anna's death as a suicide, or at least tied to her depression. In fact, I am aware that both Dr. Khris and Howard tried to convince Dr. Perper that Anna committed suicide, even before the autopsy was completed.

   Howard's family meanwhile rallied around to defend Howard and suggest that Anna's drug use was only facilitated by Anna. "He was in love with her, why would he kill her?" Howard's sister, Bonnie Stern, was quick to tell
People
magazine after Anna's death. "My brother never fed her a drug in her life. Never! Howard couldn't control the situation. It was up to Anna. When someone wants to do something, you can't stop it."

Less than twenty-four hours after her death, Anna Nicole's Bahamian home, Horizons, was "broken into" and digital photos and home videos were taken, many of which, according to Ron Rale, were "extraordinarily personal in nature." Within days of her tragic demise, photos of Anna lying on a bed with Bahamian immigration minister Shane Gibson emerged in the media. Although both of them were fully clothed, they were gazing into each other's eyes with their faces just inches apart. It was enough to force his resignation. Then, before the circus-like trial over custody of her body was over, the infamous "clown" video Howard made of Anna in an obviously impaired state made its debut.

   And it's only gotten even more peculiar from there.

   Back in the Bahamas, something interesting happened the morning of Anna's death at the five-bedroom house she had bought in December and was remodeling on the opposite end of the island from the Horizons house. The new house, in an area known as Coral Harbor, was being gutted as well as having exterior cosmetic modifications done in Anna's favorite shade of pink. Neighbor Keshlia Lockhart had been watching the work progress and had been told by King Eric, who told her he had hired the crews, that Howard and Anna had plenty of money allotted for all the renovations.

   Keshlia Lockhart's impression was that the renovations would take about three months to do. Every morning, approximately ten construction men had been working on the house for several weeks each day from 7:30 a.m. until four or four-thirty. In the week before Anna's death, they started spraying the outside of the house with a stucco type material. Anna wanted to change the light pink outside to a darker pink. They hadn't finished the spray job and had been there the day before, doing a typical day's work.

   But interestingly they did not show up the morning of the day Anna died, and have not been back since. Keshlia Lockhart thinks the timing of that is strange. She also says the lights in the house remained on for months.

   Cracker Ltd., the same company that bought the house, also bought Anna's boat. The Bahamian company was formed specifically for that purpose according to one of Howard K. Stern's attorneys, Wayne Munroe. Munroe told me that there are only two shareholders and directors for Cracker Ltd.— him and his associate attorney, Dion Smith. Dion Smith is the man who put his official signature on Dannielynn's birth certificate, which lists Howard K. Stern as the father.

   On the Saturday morning after Anna's death at approximately 7 a.m., Mark Dekema says he went for supplies and had breakfast with King Eric, Brigitte, and their first mate. He says around 10:30–11 a.m. King Eric passed the phone to Dekema to talk to Howard. Dekema asked Howard if he wanted to reconsider dealing with the boat right now after such a terrible loss. Dekema said under the circumstances, he'd understand if Howard decided that he didn't feel like caring for the boat anymore and would now want to sell it, which Dekema said he'd be happy to help him do. Howard told him his plans had not changed with the boat at all. King Eric would be taking it to Nassau right away.

   Dekema also asked Brigitte what happened to Anna the day she died. "She collapsed," Brigitte told him. Dekema was genuinely surprised when I informed him that Anna was found dead while sleeping in her bed.

• • •

In June 2007, Larry Birkhead moved into Anna's house in Los Angeles, the one right next door to Dr. Khristine Eroshevich. And he did not contest Howard being the executor of Anna's estate.

   A mutual friend of both Larry Birkhead and Howard K. Stern says he believes they reached a deal on behalf of Dannielynn and "on behalf of the almighty dollar." Regarding Anna's estate, he said, "Friends do not believe for a second that Anna only had ten thousand dollars in cash and seven hundred thousand dollars in assets [her Los Angeles house]." They wonder what happened to all the expensive jewelry Anna received from J. Howard Marshall, among other things. They believe the money is elsewhere in offshore accounts and with other companies, and friends have apparently warned Howard and Larry, "Whatever you do and say amongst yourselves, Dannielynn is going to know about it one day. Larry has America's baby now and everyone feels they have a stake in her."

   Former foes Larry Birkhead and Howard K. Stern sat sideby-side in a courtroom in June 2007 as Superior Court Commissioner Mitchell L. Beckloff admitted Anna Nicole Smith's July 30, 2001, will into probate. He ordered that Larry Birkhead, father of the late model's young daughter, would be guardian of the estate while Howard K. Stern would serve as the executor of her will.

   Gorgeous little Dannielynn, America's newest cover-girl, stands to possibly inherit millions from the estate of her mother's late husband, Texas oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall II.

   In an impromptu news conference, Stern and Birkhead took a moment to stand, once again, in the media spotlight. This time they announced they were on good terms, and that both of them were concerned for the welfare of Dannielynn and will do everything necessary to assure a good future for her.

   "I'm going to help Larry any way I can," Howard said. "Larry will be a good father."

   "I have another new title today," Larry said, smiling. "In addition to father, I'm guardian. So it's a very good day." He added that he'd had a wonderful Father's Day with his daughter. "It's one I will remember."

   "Right now, Dannielynn is the most famous baby in America," Howard said. "Maybe five years from now it won't be that way and she can just be a normal little girl." I remembered what Mark Speer, Larry's former security detail, recounted about Larry's hope that he'd make another million dollars off the rights to the first photo of him and Dannielynn before she turned eighteen.