Who is Going to Bury Anna Nicole Smith?

Late Anna Nicole Smith wanted to be buried in the Bahamas, next to her son’s grave, and bought a burial plot there, according to attorneys for her longtime companion, Howard K. Stern. Smith’s estranged mother, Vergie Arthur, wants to take the body home to Texas to be buried with family members.

The two sides faced off in Broward County Circuit Court on Thursday at a probate hearing that bounced from custody of the body to DNA sampling to whether a baby can be considered next of kin under Florida law. With several attorneys arguing loudly around a conference table, Judge Larry Seidlin tried to sort through a tangle of legal arguments and competing interests. Sitting around the table or on the phone were lawyers representing Smith, Stern, and Smith’s former lover Larry Birkhead. Also at the table were Smith’s mother and her attorneys.

The lawyers sniped at the opposing parties, and at each other. “The woman sitting across from me was estranged from her daughter. I have people who loved her,” sniffed Krista Barth, attorney for Stern. “She stands here today to take her to Texas and put her in the ground all alone. It’s sad and it’s sick.”

Retorted Arthur’s lawyer, Stephen Tunstall: “Counsel is trying to trash my client in some kind of emotional appeal. My client is her mother. She wants to take her back to Texas to be buried with the rest of the family. She has the right.”

And so it went, all day long and, from the looks of things, for many more days to come. The judge worked hard to keep things on track.

“We’re trying to balance the rights and respect of the body with the legal issues,” Seidlin said. Some progress was made: The judge appointed a guardian, Miami attorney Richard Milstein, to protect the interests of Smith’s infant daughter, Dannielynn. He also appointed an administrator, Shane Kelley, a Fort Lauderdale lawyer, to sort through the competing interests and recommend who will bury Smith, and where.

An evidentiary hearing is scheduled for Tuesday.

Smith’s body is being kept under refrigeration at the medical examiner’s office in Dania Beach. She is likely to be embalmed there as early as Friday. But any decision about releasing her body for burial isn’t likely until next week at the earliest.