Appeals court clears way for Bahamas burial for Anna Nicole Smith

A Florida appeals court has upheld a judge's ruling that will allow Anna Nicole Smith to be buried in the Bahamas.

The court rejected an appeal by Smith's mother, Virgie Arthur, to claim the body so it can be buried in Texas.

A lower court had given custody of Smith's body to the same guardian a court appointed for her daughter, five-month-old Dannielynn.

That guardian, Richard Milstein, hadagreed to Smith's wish to be buried in the Bahamas next to her 20-year-old son Daniel, who died there last year.

A funeral had been tentatively planned for Tuesday, but was postponed because of Arthur's appeal.

Milstein said Smith could now be buried as early as Thursday.

On Wednesday night, a lawyer for Arthur saidhisclient would not challenge the court ruling.

"It's going to be difficult to appeal the ruling, so we're not going to appeal," Tom Pirtle said.

Smith, 39, died at a Florida hotel on Feb. 8 of unknown causes. Toxicology tests could take another two weeks.

The former Playboy playmate lost her son Daniel last September, just three days after she had given birth to Dannielynn in a Bahamian hospital.

The rejection of Arthur's appeal should clear the way for her burial. The judges agreed she had clearly expressed a wish to be buried in the Bahamas.

The baby girl is also the subject of a custody dispute, to be determined by courts in the Bahamas.

Smith's companion, Howard K. Stern, is named father of the child on the birth certificate, but Arthuris trying to gain custody.

She saw thelittle girl for the first time on Tuesday.

The baby could inherit part of the estate of J. Howard Marshall II, whom Smith married in 1994 when he was 89 and she was 26. Smith had been fighting his family over Marshall's estimated $500-million US fortune since his death in 1995.

Two other men, Los Angeles photographer Larry Birkhead and Frederic von Anhalt, the husband of actress Zsa Zsa Gabor, have claimed paternity.

A Florida judge has ordered DNA samples from Smith's body to be turned over to Birkhead's attorney, but said he has nojurisdiction over the child as she is living in the Bahamas.