The Boobiemiester is in mourning

[BengalszoneBilly]

I shall miss her greatly. BTW, Anna was born Vickie Lynn Hogan in 1967.

. .

From the USA Today webpage:

Anna Nicole Smith dies after collapsing in Florida

By Karen Thomas, USA TODAY

Anna Nicole Smith died Thursday afternoon after collapsing in a Hollywood, Fla. hotel, local police said.

Edwina Johnson, chief investigator of the Broward County medical examiner's office, said the cause of death is under investigation and an autopsy will be performed early Friday morning by chief medical examiner Joshua Perper. Johnson says the medical examiner's office expects to announce Perper's findings immediately following the autopsy.

The former Playboy playmate collapsed Thursday afternoon and was found unresponsive in her room at the Hard Rock Seminole Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, Fla., says Los Angeles attorney Ron Rale, who represents Smith in an ongoing lawsuit regarding the paternity of her daughter. Smith was rushed by ambulance shortly after 2 p.m. to nearby Memorial Regional Hospital, where she died.

Smith had checked into the hotel Monday evening and was due to check out Friday, said Danielle Giordano, a hotel spokeswoman.

Hotel president Michael Bloom said Smith "was obviously in distress." He said Smith, who has been living in the Bahamas, did not have her baby daughter, Dannielynn, with her at the hotel. She was accompanied by her longtime lawyer and companion Howard K. Stern and four others, including a nurse. Smith was hospitalized in November with pneumonia.

Seminole, Fla. Police Chief Charlie Tiger told reporters that Smith's personal nurse found Smith unconscious in her room at 1:39 p.m. ET Thursday. Police were called at 1:45 p.m. "for a person needing medical assistance," Tiger said.

When police arrived, they found Smith, who was being given CPR by her bodyguard, he said.

Five minutes later hotel security and emergency medical technicians responded to her room and contacted local fire and rescue teams.

Smith's daughter is the center of an ongoing paternity battle with Smith's ex-boyfriend Larry Birkhead. A judge ordered this week that Smith must complete DNA testing to determine Dannielynn's father by Feb. 21. Smith's companion Stern has said that he is the baby's father. Just hours after Smith's death, lawyer Debra Opri, who represents Birkhead in the legal dispute regarding Dannielynn's paternity, was filing legal documents with the Los Angeles courts in the case. A hearing is set for Friday.

Smith gave birth to her daughter in the Bahamas in September. Three days later, her son Daniel, 20, died of a drug overdose while visiting Smith in her hospital room.

An American medical examiner hired by the family, Cyril Wecht, said he had methadone and two antidepressants in his system when he died. Low levels of the three drugs interacted to cause an accidental death, Wecht said.

"I am very, very sad, but I am not shocked," Smith's former publicist, David Granoff, told MSNBC. He said he had seen Smith on television Wednesday "and she had no spark any more."

"I had it in the back of my mind that something like this was going to happen," he said.

Friend Hugh Hefner said, "I am very saddened to learn about Anna Nicole's passing. She was a dear friend who meant a great deal to the Playboy family and to me personally. My thoughts and prayers are with her friends and loved ones during this difficult time."

"Anna was a sweetheart," Smith's former agent Darren Prince said in a statement. "I have done a number of major deals with her and Howard in the past and she was simply a pleasure to be around. My heart goes out to Howard and her family during this troubled time." Prince said he most recently saw Smith at the Pamela Anderson Roast for Comedy Central. "I will pray for her family," he said.

Recently, Smith lost a reported 69 pounds and became a spokeswoman for TrimSpa, a weight-loss supplement. Alex Goen, CEO of TrimSpa, released this statement following Smith's death:

"Today, Anna Nicole Smith's grief stricken and tumultuous personal life came to an end. Anna came to our company as a customer, but she departs it as a friend. While life for Anna Nicole was not easy these past few months, she held dear her husband, Howard K. Stern, her daughter, Dannielynn Hope, her most cherished friends, beloved dogs, and finally, her work with TRIMSPA. Anna knew both the joy of giving life, and the heartache of losing a child. We pray that she is granted the peace that eluded her more recent days on earth, and that she find comfort in the presence of her son, Daniel."

Smith had been a tabloid staple even before she became Playboy's Playmate of the Year in 1993. Readers were fascinated by her bombshell good looks, her marriage to an elderly billionaire and subsequent court fight over his estate, her weight fluctuations, and last year, the sudden death of her 20-year-old son, Daniel Smith.

A former topless dancer, she made her name squeezing into Guess jeans. She resembled the late actress Marilyn Monroe, a similarity played up in her Guess magazine ads, billboards and department store displays.

In 1994, she married 89-year-old oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall II, the head of oil-based Koch Industries, which is part of a family fortune worth at least $400 million.

He died in 1995, setting off a feud with her former stepson, E. Pierce Marshall, over whether she had a right to his estate.

A federal court in California awarded Smith $474 million in a complicated legal twist that began after she declared bankruptcy. That was later overturned.

But in May, the U.S. Supreme Court revived her case, ruling that she deserved another day in court in her battle with her former stepson.

The justices said only that federal courts in California could deal with her case despite a Texas state court ruling that Marshall was the sole heir to the estate.

Then, the stepson died June 20 at age 67.

Smith was born Vickie Lynn Hogan on Nov. 28, 1967, in Houston, one of six children of Donald Eugene and Virgie Hart Hogan.

She married Bill Smith in 1985, giving birth to Daniel before divorcing two years later.

Contributing: The Associated Press; Randy Lilleston in McLean, Va.

All in all, a sad story with an even sadder ending. All that money and fame without any happiness to be found...it sure makes you think doesn't it?

[Whur CHad At?]

had to be suicide. That woman had problems

[Ox]

I can't wait to hear what howard has to say about this. The Real Howard Stern, not Howard K Stern, that is.

[Scottishbengal]

May she rest in peace, and let 'em swing free in heaven!

[Kirkendall]

Sooo, who takes over as dumb white trash role model? Brittney?