Anna Nicole Smith with partner Howard K Stern earlier this year. Photo / Reuters
NASSAU - DNA test results ordered by a Bahamas judge to identify the father of late Playboy Playmate and tabloid star Anna Nicole Smith's six-month-old baby daughter, Dannielynn, were not made public on Tuesday.
The tests results, from a DNA swab of the child, had been widely expected
to be revealed during Tuesday's proceedings in a Nassau court.
But the closed-door session ended about 1-1/2 hours after it began without shedding any light on the paternity issue.
Damian Gomez, an attorney representing Smith's longtime companion and lawyer Howard K. Stern, said the Nassau court proceedings would resume next Tuesday.
Participants, citing a gag order, said they were unable to comment on matters raised in the courtroom. Bahamian courts operating under British legal guidelines prohibit the identification of minors in court proceedings.
Court TV quoted an unidentified source as saying the DNA test results were not revealed in open court.
Smith's death in a Florida casino hotel on Feb. 8 touched off a storm as various people fought over her body and also over her baby, who could one day be worth a fortune if the buxom blond's estate wins a decade-long battle to inherit millions from her late oil tycoon husband.
Smith was buried in the Bahamas on March 2 after a funeral where mourners included Stern, listed as Dannielynn's father on her birth certificate, and Los Angeles photographer Larry Birkhead, who also claims paternity.
Birkhead has sued for paternity in courts from Los Angeles to Miami to Nassau but some other men have also claimed they could be Dannielynn's father.
Florida officials said last week that an accidental overdose of prescription drugs including a potent sedative killed Smith, ending weeks of uncertainty over the former topless dancer's sudden death.
- REUTERS
