Federal courts could determine fate of multimillion-dollar case
By Stephanie Francis Ward
All the principals are now dead, but the multimillion-dollar federal bankruptcy case of celebrity Anna Nicole Smith may live on, experts say.
The Associated Press reported Smith, 39, died Thursday after collapsing at the Seminole, Fla., Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. The Broward County Medical Examiner’s Office told the AP the cause of death was under investigation and an autopsy would be done today.
Smith was a dancer at a strip club who became a Playboy Playmate of the Year in 1993. In 1994, she married 89-year-old Texas oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall II. Marshall died in 1995 at age 90, setting off a court battle between Smith and Marshall’s son from a previous marriage, E. Pierce Marshall, over whether she had a right to a portion of his estate.
Smith lost her case in Texas probate court, but a federal bankruptcy court in California, where she lived, awarded Smith $474 million, later reduced to $89 million. The award was based on Smith’s claim that E. Pierce Marshall tortiously interfered with her expectation of being provided for in a catchall trust under her husband’s estate plan. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned that decision.
But last May, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously overturned the San Francisco-based appeals court’s ruling. Smith’s appeal challenged the judicial doctrine of the probate exception, which ordinarily grants state courts exclusive jurisdiction over will contests. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote that the exception didn’t apply because the case involved issues normally disputed in federal court. The high court remanded the case to the 9th Circuit.
E. Pierce Marshall died June 20, but his family said their court fight would continue.
Details here from the ABA Journal.