WASHINGTON, May 1 (UPI) -- The U.S. Supreme Court Monday revived former Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith's claim to part of her late billionaire husband's fortune.
The high court unanimously sent the case back to a lower court and overturned a ruling that federal courts lacked jurisdiction in Smith's estate claim against her late husband's son, E. Pierce Marshall.
Smith and the younger Marshall have been battling over a half-billion dollar trust fund set up for her by her late husband, Texas oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall II.
Smith was 26 when she married the 89-year-old oil baron in 1994 and he died in 1995. She claims her stepson illegally interfered with her trust fund by destroying and altering documents.
She had been awarded $89 million by a federal bankruptcy judge, but an appeals court in San Francisco overturned the award, saying it would have interfered with Texas Probate Court proceedings.
