The son of former reality TV star Anna Nicole Smith was
laid to rest in Nassau on Thursday as his distraught mother shouted "I'm sorry,
I'm sorry" over his coffin, according to a witness.
About 50 people, mainly family and friends, were at the ceremony at Lakeview
Cemetery.
Anna Nicole's lawyer-boyfriend Howard Stern was among mourners and a nanny
carried their 5-week-old daughter, Dannie Lynn Hope.
Smith, 39, wearing a black dress and matching hat, was "visibly distressed,"
onlooker Felipe Major said.
"When she arrived she was crying," he said. "She was hollering and screaming
'I'm sorry, I'm sorry' over and over again" at the coffin.
Daniel Smith, 20, was found dead at his mother's bedside at Doctors Hospital
in Nassau on Sept. 10 when he was visiting his mother and baby sister, who was
born three days before.
For five weeks, his body was kept in a Nassau morgue amid mounting concern
over the length of time police were taking to complete investigations into the
cause of death. Chief magistrate Roger Gomez said this week that he was awaiting
a police report and the result of toxicology tests before deciding whether an
inquest should proceed.
American pathologist Dr. Cyril Wecht, who reviewed the autopsy results at the
family's request, disclosed three weeks ago that Daniel almost certainly died
from a lethal drug cocktail, after methadone and two anti-depressants were found
in his body.
The "acute toxicity" of the mixture would have affected the brain and lungs
and compromised the heart, Wecht said, adding that the drugs could have been
taken accidentally.
Anna Nicole Smith was Playboy's Playmate of the Year in 1993. In 1994, she
married 89-year-old oil tycoon J. Marshall Howard after meeting him at a strip
club.
His death 14 months later set off a legal battle over his estate between
Smith and her husband's son, E. Pierce Marshall, who died in June.
In May, Anna Nicole won a U.S. Supreme Court decision giving her another
chance to collect millions of dollars.
She starred in a short-lived cable television reality series, "The Anna
Nicole Show," from 2002 to 2004.