A Model Case Run Amok
Robert Alt /
The late Anna Nicole Smith is back in the news. Smith died from a drug overdose in 2007, but her lawsuit against the estate of her former husband, J. Howard Marshall, lives on. In the latest legal maneuver, the executor of her estate, Howard K. Stern—who is currently facing legal troubles of his own after being charged with conspiring to prescribe and administer drugs to the late model in violation of California law—asked Justice Kennedy to lift a stay issued by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in order to allow the estate to collect on a judgment issued by a California federal court against Marshall’s estate. Kennedy rejected the request, which comes as little surprise, given the merits of the case, and the lack of merits of the petition.
The whole tawdry tale is one of litigation run amok, which I have previously discussed here, and the ever insightful Professor Rotunda discussed more recently here. Recapping the case briefly, in an attempt to gain more than the millions in cash and gifts that she had received during his life, Anna Nicole challenged her billionaire husband’s estate plan, claiming that he had made a verbal promise of half of his fortune. The jury in Texas didn’t buy this story, so she shopped for a more receptive court in California, and she found one in a federal bankruptcy court. The Ninth Circuit dismissed the millions awarded by the court based upon a federal jurisdictional rule, but the Supreme Court in 2007 reversed, saying that the federal court could consider the merits of the case.