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Friday, March 19, 2010

Court Rules Against Anna Nicole Smith’s Estate - NYTimes.com

Interesting... The people are dead. But the fight lives one... Or should I say... the Pawns are Dead!:O

Court Rules Against Anna Nicole Smith's Estate

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: March 19, 2010

Filed at 8:19 p.m. ET

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- The elderly Texas billionaire who married Anna Nicole Smith in the last year of his life never intended to leave the former stripper any portion of his vast fortune, a federal appeals court ruled Friday.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with a Houston jury that said J. Howard Marshall was mentally fit and under no undue pressure when he wrote a will leaving nearly all of his $1.6 billion estate to his son E. Pierce Marshall and nothing to Smith.

The ruling was the latest development in the bitter 15-year legal battle. Smith said the elder Marshall promised her more than $300 million, even though there was no written documentation.

The fight between Smith and E. Pierce Marshall started in a sleepy Houston probate court and stretched all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court while outliving its two combatants.

It may reach the high court again.

Kent Richland, a lawyer for Smith's estate vowed to appeal the latest ruling, possibly to the Supreme Court on different issues than those it first considered.

''It really is a unique decision,'' Richland said. ''We have to take it farther.''