A New Book from Anna Nicole Smith Judge Larry Seidlin

Larry Seidlin, the Fort Lauderdale Judge(and former New York taxi driver) that became famous for his “straight talk” in proceedings following Anna Nicole Smith’s death, has written a book. This week The Killing of Anna Nicole Smith was released from Transit Publishing. In the book  Seidlin addresses what he sees as an epidemic of prescription drug abuse among celebrities and the people in their lives that enable this abuse and cites Michael Jackson and Heath Ledger as further examples of the problem.

Seidlin presided over the six day trial in 2007 that decided where Smith’s remains would come to rest. In the end he ruled that the former Playboy Playmate should be buried in the Bahamas. The debate over Smith’s remains was just one of many ongoing a legal battles surrounding Anna Nicole Smith.

Smith was the widow of Oil entrepreneur J. Howard Marshall II and was involved in a will contest with her husband’s youngest son that lasted over a decade and spanned district courts, probate courts in both Texas and California, California bankruptcy court and then went all the way to the Supreme Court. What and how much she was entitled to had still not been decided at the time of her death. In her article Who Will Get Anna Nicole Smith’s Money MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Susan Filan outlined the numerous cases pending  that  Smith was involved in  including: the contest over Marshall’s will, the decision over who would inherit Smith’s money once it was decided what money was hers, who was the father to her daughter Dannielyn, who would be legal guardian to Dannielyn and whether that  guardian would  have control over whatever money she stood to inherit.

Excerpts from Seidlin’s book posted on the MSNBC website include details of the 2007 case and describe how he had to  keep control in the courtroom with almost 30 attorneys involved. Given the length and complexity of the Marshall will contest which recalls something akin to Bleak House’s Jarndyce & Jarndyce,  it sounds like Seidlin should just be thankful his trial involving Smith was only six days and did not need to involve will contests, bankruptcy or  any Florida estate lawyers or Orlando probate attorneys.