Anna Nicole Smith's son buried in the Bahamas
By John Marquis (Reuters)
2006-10-20 09:33
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The son of former reality TV star Anna Nicole Smith was laid to rest in Nassau on Thursday as his distraught mother shouted "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" over his coffin, according to a witness.
About 50 people, mainly family and friends, were at the ceremony at Lakeview Cemetery.
Anna Nicole's lawyer-boyfriend Howard Stern was among mourners and a nanny carried their 5-week-old daughter, Dannie Lynn Hope.
Smith, 39, wearing a black dress and matching hat, was "visibly distressed," onlooker Felipe Major said.
"When she arrived she was crying," he said. "She was hollering and screaming 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry' over and over again" at the coffin.
Daniel Smith, 20, was found dead at his mother's bedside at Doctors Hospital in Nassau on Sept. 10 when he was visiting his mother and baby sister, who was born three days before.
For five weeks, his body was kept in a Nassau morgue amid mounting concern over the length of time police were taking to complete investigations into the cause of death. Chief magistrate Roger Gomez said this week that he was awaiting a police report and the result of toxicology tests before deciding whether an inquest should proceed.
American pathologist Dr. Cyril Wecht, who reviewed the autopsy results at the family's request, disclosed three weeks ago that Daniel almost certainly died from a lethal drug cocktail, after methadone and two anti-depressants were found in his body.
The "acute toxicity" of the mixture would have affected the brain and lungs and compromised the heart, Wecht said, adding that the drugs could have been taken accidentally.
Anna Nicole Smith was Playboy's Playmate of the Year in 1993. In 1994, she married 89-year-old oil tycoon J. Marshall Howard after meeting him at a strip club.
His death 14 months later set off a legal battle over his estate between Smith and her husband's son, E. Pierce Marshall, who died in June.
In May, Anna Nicole won a U.S. Supreme Court decision giving her another chance to collect millions of dollars.
She starred in a short-lived cable television reality series, "The Anna Nicole Show," from 2002 to 2004.