Anna Nicole Smith's messy end to a troubled life: she died more than a week ago and hasn’t received a proper burial yet.

The former model and reality TV personality may have found peace of mind now that she is no more. She’s not around any longer, to suffer from the death of her son or from the uncertain future of her daughter or from painful romantic relationships.

Yet what remains is one convoluted situation. Her estranged mother has entered the scene, claiming rights to raising Anna Nicole’s baby daughter. That same little girl is also being claimed by her mom’s lawyer and partner Howard K. Stern, former boyfriend Larry Birkhead, and Prince Frederic von Anhalt, husband of actress Zsa Zsa Gabor.

These men all claim to have fathered 6-month-old Dannielynn Hope Marshall Stern. The baby's birth certificate issued in Nassau, Bahamas, states Stern is the father. DNA tests will be performed in order to identify the true father.

What is extremely saddening is that one can’t help, really can’t help from suspecting that these people fighting over custody of young Dannielynn are not doing it out of overwhelming love for the infant.

Instead, they are well aware that she inherits her mother’s legal battle for part of the fortune of oil tycoon J Howard Marshall II. Anna Nicole married Marshall in 1994, when she was 26 and he was her senior by 63 years. Dannielynn has a good chance at inheriting an impressive fortune.

Until the father is identified, Anna Nicole’s body will have to be kept in cold storage, so as to make further tests, deemed necessary, possible. Medical examiner Dr Joshua Pepper says her body is decomposing in a morgue in Broward County, Florida.

“Further delay may affect the integrity of the body and its aesthetic appearance,� Pepper said in an affidavit to a Los Angeles court.

The body is in the jurisdiction of Florida Circuit Court Judge Larry Seidlin, who ordered another DNA sample to be taken and appointed a court officer to investigate competing claims to the body and issue a recommendation on Tuesday.