Courtroom Drama in Anna Nicole Smith Hearing

Feb. 15, 2007 — -- In a room packed with the four sets of lawyers, a joking judge, litigants, police officers, a Romanian medical examiner and the media, the dramedy over who would take control of Anna Nicole Smith's body unfolded in a way that only the late model could have fully appreciated.

Judge Larry Seidlin, of Broward County Circuit Court, mediated between four sets of lawyers packed around a small conference table. They represented Smith's mother, who wants the body buried in Texas; Howard K. Stern, Smith's companion who wants the body buried in Florida; Ron Birkhead, who has claimed he's the real father of Smith's child and is demanding that his experts be allowed to take DNA; and Ron Rail, a lawyer for Smith's estate.

The high-pitched tone of the proceedings alternated between nasty and bizarre as the competing sets of lawyers querulously demanded possession of Smith's remains.

At one point, Krista Barth, attorney for Howard K. Stern, accused Virgie Arthur, Smith's mother, of ulterior motives.

"This woman across from me was estranged from her daughter. I have people who loved her and the woman sitting across from me has not laid eyes on her daughter since 1995," said a heated Barth.

"There was no greater love than the love of Mr. Stern," Barth proclaimed.

Arthur, sat silently with a piece of crumpled Kleenex in her hand. Her husband, sitting behind her, held her shoulders.

Stephen Turnstall, Arthur's attorney, fired back. "Estranged? They want to trash my client in an attempt [at] some kind of emotional appeal. My client is the woman's mother, and she wants to take her home. Does Mr. Stern have the right to file this petition?"

Stern's lawyer, Barth, insisted that she had Smith's will, which stipulated that Smith wanted to be buried next to her deceased son, Daniel, but the circumstances of the case didn't permit her to release it.

"The reason I haven't disclosed this will is because we have enough of a media circus here. People are calling this baby a golden ticket."

She swore to Seidlin, "I have it. I am an officer of the court, and I have reviewed this will and I swear on this court … "

Turnstall responded that it was a "phantom will."

It was left to Seidlin to intervene.

"I want her to rest in peace," he told the assembled lawyers. "When we bury her I want her to be there forever. I don't want to put this court or any other court in the position that in 20 years we are exhuming her body."

And while the man with the gavel tried to establish order in his makeshift courtroom, Seidlin also appeared to relish the spotlight, turning into a principal actor in the drama over Smith's body.

At times, he played the stand-up comic who worked to lighten the mood.

"Talk to me California," he called out to Ron Rale, Smith's attorney, who had flown in from Los Angeles on the red eye. "You look thrown off."

And at times he was sentimental, "I have to satisfy my conscience and my heart and my heart is going to be telling me things."

And sometimes he was spiritual, "This body is bonding with the Lord," he told the room.

Whether it was his heart or an understanding of the stakes of the case, the judge emphasized that he was in no rush to make a decision.

"This is a journey we're going to go down together. … Do you want to work Saturday? I can't make you work Saturday unless you agree to it. I don't want to kill you. I know you have families," he said.

Larry Birkhead's attorneys quickly dominated the proceedings, demanding that new DNA samples be taken from Smith's body to help determine the father of her daughter. Both Smith's and Stern's attorneys were adamantly opposed to such a measure.

"We're not dropping the ball here," he said, addressing the lawyers of Ron Birkhead, who insisted that new DNA samples be taken from Smith's body. "We're looking at this in a global way."

Seidlin brought in Dr. Joshua Perper, the Broward County medical examiner, to answer questions on how DNA samples were taken from Smith's body and if the lawyers needed new samples.

Concerned about repeated invasion of Smith's body, he told Perper, "Let's go to a spiritual level."

The good doctor couldn't quite meet the justice on that plane. He offered Seidlin a compromise. "Well, I used to be a professor of psychiatry for a long time."

The judge retorted, "And I used to a former taxi driver so I had a lot of conversations with people."

Seidlin quizzed Perper on how long Smith's body could be kept in refrigeration without affecting the quality of a DNA sample.

Perper's answer? More than two years but less than five.

After questioning Perper, the judge asked him, "You can tell I was a former prosecutor, can't you?"

And if Seidlin took the best actor award home for his performance this morning, the best supporting actor award went to the beset upon Perper, who endured round after round of questions from Birkhead's lawyers about how he obtained and safeguarded DNA samples from Smith's body.

At one point an exasperated Perper said to Nancy Hass, one of Birkhead's attorneys, "You are not answering my question."

Hass responded, "I'm not here to answer questions. I'm here to ask them."

"You ask me a question. I give you an answer. If you don't like the answer it is very unfortunate, and you have my sympathies," Perper retorted.

Birkhead's attorneys alleged a potential conspiracy around the DNA samples, telling the judge, "Your honor, we fear a bait and switch. We were told they were going to present another child [for DNA testing]."

While the medical examiner assured them that couldn't happen, the wishes of Birkhead's lawyers ruled the day, and Seidlin ordered a second DNA test to be taken by the medical examiner's office.

But the last word went to lawyer Stephen Turnstall, who summed up the proceedings in one simple phrase: "This is wacko."