2nd Autopsy For Anna Nicole's Son
The head coroner in the Bahamas said Friday she has authorized Anna Nicole Smith's family to bring in their own pathologist to perform a second autopsy on her son, Daniel Wayne Smith, who died Sept. 10, three days after she gave birth to a daughter.
Head coroner Linda Virgill said the family's pathologist would arrive from the United States on Saturday and will perform the autopsy on Sunday.
"It is nothing unusual for families to want their own pathologist to confirm or look for something that may have been overlooked" in the autopsy by the coroner's office, Virgill told reporters.
The results of the official autopsy, which was done on Tuesday, have not been released. Virgill said a toxicology exam would be completed next week.
On Thursday, an attorney for the former Playboy playmate and reality star said that Anna Nicole Smith supports a formal inquest to determine how her 20-year-old son died while visiting her in the hospital.
"She fully wants this process to take place and she wishes the public to not jump to conclusions and to wait for the conclusion of the proceedings," said Michael Scott, one of Smith's attorneys.
A jury inquest is scheduled to begin Oct. 23. Witnesses including Smith, hospital staff and others who saw her son the night of his death were expected to be summoned.
Smith was unable to grant interviews, Scott said.
"She's resting. She's obviously devastated," he said. "It's going to take a long time to heal. She's in seclusion and she wants some privacy."
"The devastation and grief over Daniel's sudden death, coupled with the sedation has been so extreme that Anna Nicole experienced memory loss of the event."
The chief inspector of the Bahamas coroner's office on Wednesday called the death of the 20-year-old Smith "suspicious" and a formal inquiry that could lead to criminal charges was scheduled for next month. The term "suspicious," however, meant the cause was not immediately apparent and did not necessarily imply foul play, coroner Linda P. Virgill told reporters Thursday.
Police revealed that a third person was in the hospital room at the time of Daniel Smith's death. Although they withheld the name at first, police officials confirmed Thursday that the third person was Anna Nicole Smith's lawyer Howard K. Stern.
Brian Andrews Of CBS' WFOR-TV Fort Lauderdale Reports From Nassau
Scott said Anna Nicole Smith and Stern continued efforts to revive Daniel Smith even after he had been proclaimed dead by staff at Doctors Hospital in Nassau.
"Anna Nicole was so distraught at the loss of Daniel that she refused to leave his side and it was necessary to sedate her in order to check her out of the hospital," Scott read from a prepared statement Wednesday.
He said she suffered memory loss and that it "was necessary for Howard to tell Anna again that Daniel had passed away," he added.
A toxicology report on Daniel Smith was expected to be completed by next Friday. Officials said the results of the autopsy and toxicology tests would be kept secret until the inquest.
Once the toxicology report is completed, Virgill said Smith's remains will be transferred to a funeral home hired by the family to send them home to California.
Police believe Daniel Smith arrived in the Bahamas on Saturday night and went directly to Doctors Hospital in Nassau, the private facility where his half-sister was born two days earlier. He spent the night in a room with his mother and Stern.
In his statement, Scott said Stern picked up Daniel from the airport on Sept. 9 and that they drove straight to the hospital. Scott also said that the night before he died Daniel assisted his mother to the bathroom on several occasions "as she was still in a lot of pain from her C-section."
The 38-year-old noticed her son had stopped breathing in the morning and called for help, Scott has said. Hospital staff unsuccessfully tried CPR and other measures to revive him. Police have said no evidence of drugs was found at the scene.
"What we are investigating presently is how, when and by what manner Daniel came to meet his death," Virgill told Brian Andrews of CBS' WFOR-TV in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
Daniel Smith was the son of Anna Nicole and Bill Smith, who married in 1985 and divorced two years later. The son had small roles in her movies "Skyscraper" and "To the Limit." He also appeared several times on the E! reality series "The Anna Nicole Show."
The name of the father of Anna Nicole Smith's new daughter has not been publicly released.
Anna Nicole Smith married Texas oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall II in 1994, when she was 26 and he was 89. He died the following year. She then feuded with Marshall's son, Pierce Marshall, over her entitlement to the tycoon's estate before Pierce Marshall died in June at age 67.
An initial judgment of $474 million in her favor was eventually reduced to nothing, although in May the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Smith could continue to pursue her claim in federal courts in California, despite a Texas state court ruling that Marshall's youngest son was the sole heir.
