Thursday, October 5, 2006

LOS ANGELES, USA (AFP): Former Playboy model Anna Nicole Smith was urged to return to the United States from the Bahamas on Wednesday to settle the guessing game over who fathered her newborn baby daughter.

Lawyers for photographer Larry Birkhead say glamour-girl Smith, who is already grieving over the sudden death of her son last month, should return to Los Angeles so a paternity test can be carried out to establish the identity of her daughter's father.

Birkhead claims that he is the father of one-month old Dannielynn Hope, while the former playmate's lawyer Howard K. Stern said in an interview with CNN host Larry King last week that the child was his.

Smith, 38, and Stern have exchanged non-legal 'vows of commitment' and say they are planning to officially get married.

"If you are so certain that Larry Birkhead is not the father, then you have nothing to lose by ... allowing a paternity test," said Birkhead's lawyer Debra Opri in a plea to Smith after a closed hearing at Los Angeles Superior Court.

"It is the proper thing."

Opri wants a court order directing Smith to return from the Bahamas, but the case was adjourned without a ruling until October 26. Lawyers for Smith declined to comment following the hearing.

Opri also accused Stern of perjuring himself by claiming to be the girl's father. Birkhead's legal team say Los Angeles courts can adjudicate in the case because the child was conceived in the city.

The swirl of claims and counter-claims surrounding Smith have gripped media ever since her 20-year-old son Daniel died suddenly in early September just three days after the birth of his half-sister in the Bahamas.

A private autopsy ordered by Smith found that Daniel, who had been visiting his mother in Nassau, died after accidentally consuming a lethal cocktail of heroin-substitute methadone and anti-depressants.

In a reference to the tragedy, Opri said Smith should understand Birkhead's plight because she "knows what it is to be a parent" and what it means to "love and lose a child."

Lawyers for Smith meanwhile criticised Opri for going public about the paternity case when his client was still mourning the death of her son.

"I'm surprised (they) came out and made that statement," Ronald Rale said. "She's grieving right now ... It's not a good time for Anna Nicole."

Smith, a 1992 Playmate of the Year and a Guess Jeans model, has been prime fodder for US tabloids ever since her year-long marriage to billionaire J. Howard Marshall -- 63 years her senior -- who died in 1995 aged 90.

The blonde bombshell has been locked in a bitter legal battle with Marshall's family over her claim to a multi-million dollar slice of her late husband's vast fortune.

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