SAN FRANCISCO — 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 a bitter 15-year legal battle.
Kent Richland, an attorney for Smith’s estate, vowed to appeal the latest ruling, possibly to the Supreme Court.
The decision — if it holds up — is bad news for Smith’s ex-boyfriend Larry Birkhead and their 3-year-old daughter, Dannielynn. The child was named Smith’s heir in 2008 after Smith died of a drug overdose at age 39. The Associated Press
