KEY POINTS:
Rumors and drama continue to swirl around the tragic death of former Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith in Florida last week.
An autopsy carried out at the weekend did not immediately determine the cause of death, leaving fans and media to speculate over what took place in the
days before Anna Nicole died,
A fight is also emerging over who will care for her 5-month-old daughter Dannielynn Hope.
Howard K. Stern, Anna Nicole's companion, has returned to the Bahamas from Florida to care for Dannielynn, according to People magazine. The moment they were re-united was filmed for broadcast on Entertainment Tonight.
Stern, who claims he is the father of Dannielynn, told ET he would fight the attepmpts of Anna's mother Virgie Arthur to gain protective custory of the child.
"Anna despised that woman. As long as I have breath in my body, that woman will not see Dannielynn," Stern reportedly told ET's Mark Steines.
"She can't take my baby. This is the only piece of Anna I have left."
California photographer Larry Birkhead, who has long claimed to be the father of Dannielynn, is also waging a court battle for parternity tests he says will prove he is the child's father.
Birkhead posted a tribute to Anna Nicole on his website at the weekend calling her "my sweet potato".
"Chance brought us together, our love couldn't keep us apart," the tribute read.
"I loved her in life and I will love her long after."
Celebrity gossip website TMZ.com is displaying photos showing the inside of a refrigerator it says was found in Anna Nicole's bedroom in the Bahamas. The photos show bottles of diet drink Slim Fast, a bottle of the drug methadone and vials of injectable medicines.
Entertainment Tonight reports a friend and confidante of Anna Nicole - Khristine Eroshevich - as saying Anna had been running a high fever in the days before her death. She was given medication and her temperature dropped allowing her to fly to Florida. The next day she fell in the bathroom and hit her head. She said she was feeling fine, had a meal and went back to bed.
The following day, Eroshevich says she received the call from Howard saysing Anna was dead.
Broward County medical examiner Dr. Joshua Perper, who carried out the autopsy on Anna Nicole, said it could take three to five weeks to finish toxicological and other tests, however no pills were found in her stomach.
Perper has also been reported as saying he saw no signs that Anna was drinking the day of her death, even though she was spotted in a bar. According to the Miami Herald, although she had an enlarged liver, he says, "There was no scent of alcohol in her stomach lining, no residue, nothing."
- NZHERALD STAFF
